In 864, the Council of Worms decreed that some bees which
had killed a man by stinging, should be suffocated in their hives
Sentence pronounced condemning a pig
to be hanged and strangled for infanticide committed on
the fee-farm of Clermont-lez-Montcornet
Fined 18 francs for negligence, because
the child was their fosterling
minutest details of the proceedings, ending with
execution of the pig
In the year 1565 the people in the town of Arles in Provence indicted
some grasshoppers
for injury done the fruits of the field
Competency as witnesses
As not to know the nature and quality of the act
At Falaise, in 1386, a sow was sentenced by the commune
to be mangled in the face and maimed in the forelegs
It had torn the face and arms of a child
a kind of iron cage or pillory set up in the marketplace
tormented by flies
A cock finds a precious stone in a dunghill
He leaves the jewel in the dunghill:
“no thynge have I to do with thē”
Reported to have laid eggs
a chicken passing for a rooster
Laid an egg and was prosecuted by law
But contended that the laying of the egg
in this particular case
had been entirely unpremeditated and involuntary
The cock is a fool for the stone is wisdom
The cock was condemned and was burned at the stake
In 1456 two pigs were thus punished at Oppenheim on the Rhine
for killing a child
And bestrode his body like a fretful mother cow
The church had the right, by its anathema
to compel the insects to stop ravaging but also
that the insects had the legal right to live
since his clients had been created, they
were justified in eating what was necessary for their welfare
Until finally, as a sort of compromise,
the authorities set apart a plot of ground outside the village
for the sole use and benefit of the weevils in perpetuity
Against the noxious host, which creeping secretly in the earth
Allegation, replication, and judgment in the process against
field-mice
at Stelvio in 1519
And wantonly destroyed the barley of that province
to quit the aforesaid fields and withdraw to the place assigned them
But also all cattle after their kind
Letters patent, by which
Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, on Sept. 12, 1379
pardoned two herds of swine
The peasants of the Electorate of Mayence brought a complaint
against some Spanish flies
appointed attorneys
lest they should remain defenseless:
Gentlemen, inasmuch as you have chosen me to defend these little beasts
Where this element is wanting, there is no culpability
By being read officially before the hills of the termites
the said summons had been duly issued
That they should seek their food
in wild and wooded places and cease
from ravaging cultivated grounds
Five copies of same posted each on a tree in the five forests of the territory
than they all came out
Iniquitous
Some rats were brought to trial before the bishop’s vicar
He argued that
Made his reputation as counsel for some rats
Of serving a writ of ejectment on rats
for having eaten and wantonly destroyed some barley crops in that district
The note expresses an interest in their welfare, but asks them to leave
Messrs. Rats & Co.,
In regard to your winter quarters
Seeing as you have pitched your winter quarters
As a patch of waste-ground, on your own land
Their eyes shine and flash in the dark
Again in 1541, a cloud of locusts fell on Lombardy
The People versus Locusts
As legal persons
who spare neither corn nor vines
Having buried in the earth two pigs, which had torn a little child
Or if a horse kick a keeper and kill him
That the bull had met with its deserts
and had been justly put to death
Buried up to his neck
And to have his head plowed off with a new plow
To nail the dead hawk to his barn-door
A man named Gilles Garnier, who ran on all fours in the forest
Where is he? Why doesn’t he move? Is he dead?
Buried in a hole with the filthy straw of the cage
We read of a he-goat being exiled to Siberia
Whether the object of it should be retributive or preventive?
In the year 1565 at Montpellier a man and a mule
were burnt alive for this offence
For the barren tree, cumberer of the orchard
As a condemnation and punishment of the tree
for its delinquencies
A shuddering of fear may have run through all the leaves of the tree
So far as his own person is concerned
So far as
A monkey often takes delight in doing what is wrong
When a dog does wrong, he knows that he is doing wrong
And then only whistle, to make him return
To make him return for the execution
Two wolves in brogans hanging on the gallows
As accomplices
He that will bite must expects be bitten
In 1394 a pig was hanged at Mortaigne
In 1457 at Lavegny, a sow and her litter were charged with
having partially devoured a child
The sow condemned to death but her piglets
released because of their tender age
Because their mother had set them a bad example
Willing to bear witness the mare in word and deed and
in all her habits of life
a most honest creature
Condemning a sow with a black snout
to be hanged for her cruelty and ferocity in murdering a girl of four months,
March 27, 1567, Senlis
But will not have the slightest effect in preventing other pigs?
The sow was found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging
The dog is found guilty and sentenced to the gallows
Hoping thereby to find some loophole
To what extent the will of the accused was
And then only whistle, to make him return