Chapter I: Part 1

HEADS AND TALES.

PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE AND COMPANY
EDINBURGH AND LONDON

HEADS AND TALES;

OR,

ANECDOTES AND STORIES OF QUADRUPEDS
AND OTHER BEASTS,

CHIEFLY CONNECTED WITH INCIDENTS IN THE
HISTORIES OF MORE OR LESS DISTINGUISHED MEN.

COMPILED AND SELECTED BY

ADAM WHITE,
LATE ASSISTANT IN THE ZOOLOGICAL DEPARTMENT, BRITISH MUSEUM.

Second Edition.

LONDON:
JAMES NISBET & CO., 21 BERNERS STREET.
MDCCCLXX.

PREFACE.

In this work, a part of which is, so far as it extends, a careful compilation from an extensive series of books, the great order mammalia, or, rather, a few of its subjects, is treated anecdotically. The connexion of certain animals with man, and the readiness with which man can subdue even the largest of the mammalia, are very curious subjects of thought. The dog and horse are our special friends and associates; they seem to understand us, and we get very much attached to them. The cat or the cow, again, possess a different degree of attachment, and have "heads and hearts" less susceptible of this education than the first mentioned. The anecdotes in this book will clearly show facts of this nature. In the Letter of the Gorilla, under an appearance of exaggeration, will be found many facts of its history. We have a strong belief that natural history, written as White of Selborne did his Letter of Timothy the Tortoise, would be very enticing and interesting to young people. To make birds and other animals relate their stories has been done sometimes, and generally with success. There are anecdotes hinging, however, on animals which have more to do with man than the other mammals referred to in the little story. These stories we have felt to be very interesting when they occur in biographies of great men. Cowper and his Hares, Huygens and his Sparrow, are tales--at least the former--full of interesting matter on the history of the lower animal, but are of most value as showing the influence on the man who amused himself by taming them. We like to know that the great Duke, after getting down from his horse Copenhagen, which carried him through the whole battle of Waterloo, clapped him on the neck, when the war-charger kicked out, as if untired.

We could have added greatly to this book, especially in the part of jests, puns, or cases of _double entendre_. The few selected may suffice. The so-called conversations of "the Ettrick Shepherd" are full of matter of this kind, treated by "Christopher North" with a happy combination of rare power of description and apt exaggeration of detail, often highly amusing. One or two instances are given here, such as the Fox-hunt and the Whale. The intention of this book is primarily to be amusing; but it will be strange if it do not instruct as well. There is much in it that is _true_ of the habits of mammalia. These, with birds, are likely to interest young people generally, more than anecdotes of members of orders like fish, insects, or molluscs, lower in the scale, though often possessing marvellous instincts, the accounts of which form intensely interesting reading to those who are fond of seeing or hearing of "the works of the Lord," and who "take pleasure" in them.

CONTENTS.

MAMMALIA.[1]

PAGE
MAN 1

Gainsborough's Joke--Skull of Julius Caesar when a boy 2

Sir David Wilkie's simplicity about Babies 3

James Montgomery translates into verse a description of
Man, after the manner of Linnaeus 4

Addison and Sir Richard Steele's Description of Gimcrack
the Collector 5

MONKEYS 9

The Gorilla and its Story 9

The Orang-Utan 11

The Chimpanzee 12

Letter of Mr Waterton 20

Mr Mitchell and the Young Chimpanzee 22

Lady Anne Barnard pleads for the Baboons 24

S. Bisset and his Trained Monkeys 25

Lord Byron's Pets 26

The Ettrick Shepherd's Monkey 27

The Findhorn Fisherman and the Monkey 29

"We ha'e seen the _Enemy_!" 29

The French Marquis and his Monkey 30

George IV. and Happy Jerry.--Mr Cross's Rib-nosed
Baboon at Exeter Change 31

The Young Lady's pet Monkey and the poor Parrot 33

Monkeys "poor relations" 34

Sydney Smith on Monkeys 34

Mrs Colin Mackenzie on the Apes at Simla 35

The Aye-Aye, or Cheiromys of Madagascar 36

BATS 38

One of Captain Cook's Sailors sees a Fox-Bat, and describes
it as a devil 39

Fox Bats (_with a Plate_) 41

Dr Mayerne and his Balsam of Bats 47

HEDGEHOG 48

Robert Southey to his Critics 48

MOLE 49

Mole, cause of Death of William III. 49

BROWN BEAR 56

The Austrian General and the Bear--"Back, rascal, I
am a general!" 58

Lord Byron's Bear at Cambridge 59

Charles Dickens on Bear's Grease and Bear-keepers 59

A Bearable Pun 60

A Shaved Bear 61

POLAR BEAR 61

General History and Anecdotes of Polar Bear, as observed
on recent Arctic Expeditions (_with a Plate_) 61

Nelson and the Polar Bear 67

A Clever Polar Bear 67

Captain Ommaney and the Polar Bear 70

RACCOON 71

"A Gone Coon" 71

BADGER 71

Hugh Miller sees the "Drawing of the Badger" 72

The Laird of Balnamoon and the Brock 75

FERRET 75

Collins and the Rat-catcher, with the Ferret 76

POLE-CAT 76

Fox and the Poll-Cat 77

DOG 77

Phrases about Dogs 77

Cowper's Dog 79

Cowper and his dog Beau 81

Burns's "Twa Dogs" 81

Dog of Assyrian Monument 86

Bishop Blomfield bitten by a Dog 88

Sydney Smith's Remark on it 88

Bishop of Bristol--"Puppies never see till they are nine
days old" 88

Mrs Browning, the Poetess, and her dog Flush 89

Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, Bart., and his dog Speaker 93

Lord Byron and his dog Boatswain 94

Lady's reason for calling her dog Perchance 96

Collins the Artist and his dog Prinny--the faithful
Model 96

Soldier and Dog 97

Bark and Bite!--Curran on Lord Clare and his Dog 98

Mrs Drew and the two Dogs 98

Gainsborough and his Wife and their Dogs 100

Sir William Gell's Dog, which was said to speak 101

The Duke of Gordon's Wolf-hounds 102

Frederick the Great and his Italian Greyhounds 104

The Dog and the French Murderers 104

Hannah More on Garrick's Dog 105

Rev. Robert Hall and the Dog 106

A Queen (Henrietta Maria) and her Lap-Dog 106

The Clever Dog that belonged to the Hunters of Polmood 107

The Irish Clergyman and the Dogs 108

Washington Irving and the Dog 108

Douglas Jerrold and his Dog 109

Sheridan and the Dog 109

Charles Lamb and his dog "Dash" 110

French Dogs of Louis XII. 110

Martin Luther observes a Dog at Lintz 111

Poor Dog at the Grotta del Cane 111

Dog a Postman and Carrier 113

South and Sherlock--Dog-matic 113

General Moreau and his Greyhound 113

Duke of Norfolk and his Spaniels 114

Lord North and the Dog 115

Perthes derives Hints from his Dog 115

Peter the Great and his dog Lisette 116

The Light Company's Poodle and Sir F. Ponsonby 118

Admiral Rodney and his dog Loup 119

Ruddiman and his dog Rascal 119

Mrs Schimmelpenninck and the Dogs 120

Sir Walter Scott and his Dogs 122

Sheridan on the Dog-Tax 123

Sydney Smith dislikes Dogs.--An ingenious way of getting
rid of them 124

Sydney Smith on Dogs 125

Sydney Smith.--"Newfoundland Dog that breakfasted
on Parish Boys" 126

Robert Southey on his Dogs 126

A Dog that was a good judge of Elocution.--Mr True
and his Pupil 127

Dog that tried to please a Crying Child 128

Horace Walpole's pet dog Rosette 128

Horace Walpole.--Arrival of his dog Tonton 129

Horace Walpole.--Death of his dog Tonton 130

Archbishop Whateley and his Dogs 131

Archbishop Whately on Dogs 132

Sir David Wilkie.--A Dog Rose 133

Ulysses and his Dog 133

WOLF 135

Polson and the Last Wolf in Sutherlandshire 135

"If the tail break, you'll find that" 137

FOX 138

An Enthusiastic Fox-hunting Surgeon 138

Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, on the Pleasures of Fox-hunting,
and the gratification of the Fox 139

Arctic Foxes converted into Postmen, with Anecdotes
(_with a plate_) 142

JACKAL 148

Burke on the Jackal and Tiger 149

CAT 149

Jeremy Bentham and his pet cat "Sir John Langborn 150

S. Bisset and his Musical Cats 152

Constant, Chateaubriand, and their Cats 153

Liston, the Surgeon, and his Cat 153

The Banker Mitchell's Antipathy to Kittens 154

James Montgomery and his Cats 155

David Ritchie's Cat 157

Sir Walter Scott's Visit to the Black Dwarf 157

Southey, the Poet, and his Cats 158

Archbishop Whateley and the Cat that used to ring the
Bell 160

TIGER AND LION 161

Bussapa, the Tiger-slayer, and the Tiger 162

John Hunter and the Dead Tiger 164

Mrs Mackenzie on the Indian's regard and awe for the
Tiger 165

Jolly Jack-tar on Lion and Tiger 166

Androcles and the Lion 167

Sir George Davis and the Lion 170

Canova's Lions and the Child 171

Admiral Napier and the Lion in the Tower 173

Old Lady and the Beasts on the Mound 173

SEALS 174

Dr Adam Clarke on Shetland Seals 175

Dr Edmonstone and the Shetland Seals 176

The Walrus or Morse (_with a Plate_) 182

KANGAROO 188

Charles Lamb on its Peculiarities 188

Captain Cooke's Sailor and the first Kangaroo seen 189

Charles Lamb on Kangaroos having Purses in front 189

Kangaroo Cooke 189

TIGER WOLF 190

SQUIRREL, &c. 194

Jekyll on a Squirrel 195

Pets of some of the Parisian Revolutionary Butchers 195

Sir George Back and the poor Lemming 196

McDougall and Arctic Lemming 197

RATS AND MICE 198

Duke of Wellington and Musk-Rat 200

Lady Eglinton and the Rats 200

General Douglas and the Rats 201

Hanover Rats 202

Irishman Shooting Rats 203

James Watt and the Rat's Whiskers 204

Gray the Poet compares Poet-Laureate to Rat-catcher 204

Jeremy Bentham and the Mice 205

Robert Burns and the Field Mouse 206

Fuller on Destructive Field Mice 208

Baron Von Trenck and the Mouse in Prison 209

Alexander Wilson, the American Ornithologist, and the
Mouse 211

HARES, RABBITS, GUINEA-PIG 212

William Cowper on his Hares 213

Lord Norbury on the Exaggeration of a Hare-Shooter 220

Duke of L. prefers Friends to Hares 221

S. Bisset and his Trained Hare and Turtle 221

Lady Anne Barnard on a Family of Rabbits all blind of
one eye 222

Thomas Fuller on Norfolk Rabbits 222

Dr Chalmers and the Guinea-Pig 223

SLOTH 224

Sydney Smith on the Sloth--a Comparison 224

THE GREAT ANT-EATER (_with a Plate_) 225

ELEPHANT 229

Lord Clive--Elephant or Equivalent? 230

Canning on the Elephant and his Trunk 232

Sir R. Phillips and Jelly made of Ivory Dust 233

J. T. Smith and the Elephant 234

Sydney Smith on the Elephant and Tailor 235

Elephant's Skin--a teacher put down 236

FOSSIL PACHYDERMATA 236

Cuvier's Enthusiasm over Fossils 236

SOW 238

"There's a hantle o' miscellaneous eatin' aboot a Pig" 238

"Pig-Sticking at Chicago" 238

Monument to a Pig at Luneberg 239

WILD BOAR (_with a Plate_) 239

THE RIVER PIG (_with a Plate_) 245

S. Bisset and his Learned Pig 250

Quixote Bowles fond of Pigs 251

On Jekyll's treading on a small Pig 251

Good enough for a Pig 251

Gainsborough's Pigs 252

Theodore Hook and the Litter of Pigs 253

Lady Hardwicke's Pig--her Bailiff 253

Pigs and Silver Spoon 253

Sydney Smith on Beautiful Pigs 254

Joseph Sturge, when a boy, and the Pigs 255

RHINOCEROS 229

The Lord Keeper Guildford and the Rhinoceros in the
City of London 230

HORSE 256

Horse shot under Albert 256

Bell-Rock Lighthouse Horse 257

Edmund Burke and the Horse 257

David Garrick and his Horse, "A horse! a horse! my
kingdom for a horse!" 258

Bernard Gilpin's Horses stolen and recovered 260

The Herald and George III.'s Horse 261

Rev. Rowland Hill and his Horse 261

Holcroft on the Horse 263

Lord Mansfield, his Joke about a Horse 267

Sir John Moore and his Horse at Corunna 268

Neither Horses nor Children can explain their Complaints 269

Horses with Names 270

Rennie the Engineer and the Horse Old Jack 270

Sydney Smith and his Horses 271

Sydney Smith.--He drugs his Domestic Animals 273

Horseback, an Absent Clergyman 273

Judge Story and the Names he gave his Horses 274

Short-tailed and Long-tailed Horses at Livery, difference
of Charge 275

ASS AND ZEBRA 276

Coleridge on the Ass 276

Collins and the old Donkey at Odell 276

Gainsborough kept one to Study from 277

Irishman on the Ramsgate Donkeys 278

Douglas Jerrold and the Ass's Foal 278

The Judge and the Barrister 279

Ass that loved Poetry 279

Warren Hastings and the refractory Donkey 279

Northcote, an Angel at an Ass 281

Sydney Smith's Donkey with Jeffrey on his back 281

Sydney Smith on the Sagacity of the Ass 283

Sydney Smith's Deers, how he introduced them into
his Grounds to gratify Visitors 284

Asses' Duty Free 284

Thackeray on Egyptian Donkey 285

Zebra, a Frenchman's _double-entendre_ 287

CAMELS 287

Captain William Peel, R.N., on Camel 287

Captain in Royal Navy measures the progress of the
Ship of the Desert 289

Lord Metcalfe on a Camel when a Boy 290

RED DEER 291

Earl of Dalhousie and the ferocious Stag 291

The French Count and the Stag 293

FALLOW DEER 294

Venison Fat, Reynolds and the Gourmand 294

Goethe on Stag-trench at Frankfort-on-Maine 294

GIRAFFE 295

"Fancy Two Yards of Sore Throat!" 295

SHEEP AND GOAT 295

How many Legs has a Sheep? 296

Goethe on Roos's Etchings of Sheep 296

Lord Cockburn and the Sheep 298

Erskine's Sheep--an Eye to the Woolsack 298

Sandy Wood and his Pet Sheep and Raven 298

General Carnac and She-goat 299

John Hunter and the Shawl-goat 300

Commodore Keppel _beards_ the Dey of Algiers 303

OX 304

Irish Bulls 304

A great Calf! "The more he sucked the greater Calf he
grew!" 304

Veal _ad nauseam!_ too much of a good thing 304

James Boswell should confine himself to the Cow 305

Rev. Adam Clarke and his Bullock Pat 305

Samuel Foote and the Cows pulling the Bell of Worcester
College 306

The General's Cow at Plymouth 308

Gilpin's Love of the Picturesque carried out--a reason
for keeping three Cows 308

King James on a Cow getting over the Border 309

Duke of Montague and his Hospital for Old Cows and
Horses 309

Philip IV. of Spain in the Bull-ring 310

Sydney Smith and his "Universal Scratcher" 311

Rev. Augustus Toplady on the Future State of Animals--the
Rev. William Bull 312

Windham on the Feelings of a Baited Bull 313

WHALE 315

A Porpoise not at Home 315

Whalebone 315

"What's to become o' the puir Whales?" 316

Very like a Whale! 316

Christopher North on the Whale 316

FOOTNOTES:

[1] There are many anecdotes in this book not included in this list, which gives however, the principal.

HEADS AND TALES.

MAN.

In this collection, like Linnaeus, we begin with man as undoubtedly an animal, as opposed to a vegetable or mineral. Like Professor Owen, we are inclined to fancy he is well entitled to separate rank from even the Linnaean order, _Primates_, and to have more systematic honour conferred on him than what Cuvier allowed him. That great French naturalist placed man in a section separate from his four-handed order, _Quadrumana_, and, from his two hands and some other qualities, enrolled our race in an order, _Bimana_. Surely the ancients surpassed many modern naturalists of the Lamarckian school, who would derive him from an ourang, a chimpanzee, or a gorilla. One of them has nobly said--

"Os homini sublime dedit, coelumque tueri."

Our own Sir William Hamilton, in a few powerful words has condensed what will ever be, we are thankful to suppose, the general idea of most men, be they naturalists or not, that mind and soul have much to distinguish us from every other animal:--

"What man holds of matter does not make up his personality. Man is not an organism. He is an intelligence served by organs. _They are_ HIS, _not_ HE."

As a mere specimen, we subjoin two or three anecdotes, although the species, _Homo sapiens_, has supplied, and might supply, many volumes of anecdotes touching on his whims and peculiarities. As a good example of the Scottish variety, who is there that does not know Dean Ramsay's "Reminiscences?" Surely each nation requires a similar judicious selection. Mr Punch, especially when aided by his late admirable artist, John Leech, shows seemingly that John Bull and his family are as distinct from the French, as the French are from the Yankees.

THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH THE ARTIST, AND THE TAILOR.

Gainsborough, the painter, was very ready-witted. His biographer[2] records the following anecdote of him as very likely to be authentic. The great artist occasionally made sketches from an honest old tailor, of the name of Fowler, who had a picturesque countenance and silver-gray locks. On the chimney-piece of his painting-room, among other curiosities, was a beautiful preparation of an infant _cranium_, presented to the painter by his old friend, Surgeon Cruickshanks. Fowler, without moving his position, continually peered at it askance with inquisitive eye. "Ah! Master Fowler," said the painter, "that is a mighty curiosity." "What might it be, sir, if I may be so bold?" "A _whale's eye_," replied Gainsborough. "Oh! not so; never say so, Muster Gainsborough. Laws! sir, it is a little child's skull!" "You have hit upon it," said the wag. "Why, Fowler, you are a witch! But what will you think when I tell you that it is the skull of _Julius Caesar_ when he was a little boy?" "Do you say so!" exclaimed Fowler, "what a phenomenon!"

This reminds us of a similar story told of a countryman, who was shown the so-called skull of Oliver Cromwell at the museum in Oxford, and expressed his delight by saying how gratifying it was to see skulls of great men at different ages, for he had just seen at Bath the skull of the Protector when a youth!

SIR DAVID WILKIE AND THE BABY.

A very popular novelist and author of the present day tells the following anecdote of the simplicity of Sir David Wilkie, with regard to his knowledge of _infant_ human nature:--

On the birth of his first son, at the beginning of 1824, William Collins,[3] the great artist, requested Sir David Wilkie to become one of the sponsors for his child.[4] The painter's first criticism on his future godson is worth recording from its simplicity. Sir David, whose studies of human nature extended to everything but _infant_ human nature, had evidently been refreshing his faculties for the occasion, by taxing his boyish recollections of puppies and kittens; for, after looking intently into the child's eyes as it was held up for his inspection, he exclaimed to the father, with serious astonishment and satisfaction, "He _sees_!"

MAN DEFINED SOMEWHAT IN THE LINNAEAN MANNER.

One who is partial to the Linnaean mode of characterising objects of natural history has amused himself with drawing up the following definition of man:--"_Simia sine cauda; pedibus posticis ambulans; gregarius, omnivorus, inquietus, mendax, furax, rapax, salax, pugnax, artium variarum capax, animalium reliquorum hostis, sui ipsius inimicus acerrimus._"

Montgomery translated the description thus:--

"Man is an animal unfledged,
A monkey with his tail abridged;
A thing that walks on spindle legs,
With bones as brittle, sir, as eggs;
His body, flexible and limber,
And headed with a knob of timber;
A being frantic and unquiet,
And very fond of beef and riot;
Rapacious, lustful, rough, and martial,
To lies and lying scoundrels partial!
By nature form'd with splendid parts
To rise in science--shine in arts;
Yet so confounded cross and vicious,
A mortal foe to all his species!
His own best _friend_, and you must know,
His own worst _enemy_ by being so!"[5]

ADDISON AND STEELE ON SOME OF THE PECULIARITIES OF THE NATURAL HISTORY COLLECTORS OF THE DAY.

In one of the early volumes of _Chambers's Edinburgh Journal_, there was a very curious paper entitled "Nat Phin." Although considerably exaggerated, no one who had the happiness of knowing the learned, amiable, and excellent Dr Patrick Neill, could fail to recognise, in the transposed title, an amusing description of his love of natural history pets, zoological and botanical. The fun of the paper is that "Nat" gets married, and, coming home one day from his office, finds that his young wife has caused the gardener to clear out his ponds of tadpoles and zoophytes.

Addison or Sir Richard Steele, or both of them, in the following paper of the _Tatler_ (No. 221, Sept. 7, 1710), has given one of those quietly satiric pictures of many a well-known man of the day, some Petiver or Hans Sloane. The widow Gimcrack's letter is peculiarly racy. Although old books, the _Tatler_ and _Spectator_ still furnish rare material to many a popular magazine writer of the day, who sometimes does little more than dilute a paper in these and other rare repertories of the style and wit of a golden age. We meditated offering various extracts from Swift and Daniel Defoe; but our space limits us to one, and the following may for the present suffice.

"_From my own Apartment, September 6._

"As I was this morning going out of my house, a little boy in a black coat delivered me the following letter. Upon asking who he was, he told me that he belonged to my Lady Gimcrack. I did not at first recollect the name, but, upon inquiry, I found it to be the widow of Sir Nicholas, whose legacy I lately gave some account of to the world. The letter ran thus:--

"'MR BICKERSTAFF,--I hope you will not be surprised to receive a letter from the widow Gimcrack. You know, sir, that I have lately lost a very whimsical husband, who, I find, by one of your last week's papers, was not altogether a stranger to you. When I married this gentleman, he had a very handsome estate; but, upon buying a set of microscopes, he was chosen a _Fellow of the Royal Society; from which time I do not remember ever to have heard him speak as other people did_, or talk in a manner that any of his family could understand him. He used, however, to pass away his time very innocently in conversation with several members of that learned body: for which reason I never advised him against their company for several years, until at last I found his brain quite turned with their discourses. The first symptoms which he discovered of his being a _virtuoso_, as you call him, poor man! was about fifteen years ago; when he gave me positive orders to turn off an old weeding woman, that had been employed in the family for some years. He told me, at the same time, that there was no such thing in nature as a weed, and that it was his design to let his garden produce what it pleased; so that, you may be sure, it makes a very pleasant show as it now lies. About the same time he took a humour to ramble up and down the country, and would often bring home with him his pockets full of moss and pebbles. This, you may be sure, gave me a heavy heart; though, at the same time, I must needs say, he had the character of a very honest man, notwithstanding he was reckoned a little weak, until he began to sell his estate, and buy those strange baubles that you have taken notice of. Upon midsummerday last, as he was walking with me in the fields, he saw a very odd-coloured butterfly just before us. I observed that he immediately changed colour, like a man that is surprised with a piece of good luck; and telling me that it was what he had looked for above these twelve years, he threw off his coat, and followed it. I lost sight of them both in less than a quarter of an hour; but my husband continued the chase over hedge and ditch until about sunset; at which time, as I was afterwards told, he caught the butterfly as she rested herself upon a cabbage, near five miles from the place where he first put her up. He was here lifted from the ground by some passengers in a very fainting condition, and brought home to me about midnight. His violent exercise threw him into a fever, which grew upon him by degrees, and at last carried him off. In one of the intervals of his distemper he called to me, and, after having excused himself for running out his estate, he told me that he had always been more industrious to improve his mind than his fortune, and that his family must rather value themselves upon his memory as he was a wise man than a rich one. He then told me that it was a custom among the Romans for a man to give his slaves their liberty when he lay upon his death-bed. I could not imagine what this meant, until, after having a little composed himself, he ordered me to bring him a flea which he had kept for several months in a chain, with a design, as he said, to give it its manumission. This was done accordingly. He then made the will, which I have since seen printed in your works word for word. Only I must take notice that you have omitted the codicil, in which he left a large _concha veneris_, as it is there called, to a _Member of the Royal Society_, who was often with him in his sickness, and _assisted him in his will_. And now, sir, I come to the chief business of my letter, which is to desire your friendship and assistance in the disposal of those many rarities and curiosities which lie upon my hands. If you know any one that has an occasion for a parcel of dried spiders, I will sell them a pennyworth. I could likewise let any one have a bargain of cockle-shells. I would also desire your advice whether I had best sell my beetles in a lump or by retail. The gentleman above mentioned, who was my husband's friend, would have me make an auction of all his goods, and is now drawing up a catalogue of every particular for that purpose, with the two following words in great letters over the head of them, Auctio Gimcrackiana. But, upon talking with him, I begin to suspect he is as mad as poor Sir Nicholas was. Your advice in all these particulars will be a great piece of charity to, Sir, your most humble servant,

"'ELIZABETH GIMCRACK.'

"I shall answer the foregoing letter, and give the widow my best advice, as soon as I can find out chapmen for the wares which she has to put off."

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Life of Thomas Gainsborough, R.A. By the late George Williams Fulcher. Edited by his Son. P. 157.

[3] Memoir of the Life of William Collins, R.A. By W. Wilkie Collins. I., p. 235.

[4] The future author of "The Woman in White" and "The Dead Secret," and many other works of celebrity.

[5] Memoirs of James Montgomery. By Holland and Everett. I., p. 283.

MONKEYS.

THE GORILLA AND ITS STORY.

In the British Museum, in handsome glass cases, and on the floors of the three first rooms at the top of the stairs, may be seen the largest collection of the skins and skeletons of quadrupeds ever brought together. In the third, or principal room, will be found a nearly complete series of the QUADRUMANA or four-handed Mammalia. Monkeys are _quadrumanous mammalia_. The resemblance of these animals to men is most conspicuous, in the largest of them, such as the gorilla, orang-utan, chimpanzee, and the long-armed or gibbous apes. Such resemblance is most distant in the ferocious dog-faced baboons of Africa, the _Cynocephali_ of the ancients. It is softened off, but not effaced, in the pretty little countenances of those dwarf pets from South America, the ouistities or marmosets, and other species of new-world monkeys, some of which are not larger than a squirrel.

They are well called MONKEYS, Monnikies, Mannikies--little men, "_Simiae quasi bestiae hominibus similes_," "monkeys, as if beasts resembling man," or "mon," as the word man is pronounced in pure _Doric_ Saxon, whether in York or Peebles.

"Monkey! you very degraded little brute, how much you resemble us!" said old Ennius, without ever fancying that the day would come when some men would regard their own race as little better than highly-advanced monkeys.

Let us never for a moment rest in such fallacious theories, or accept the belief of Darwin and Huxley, with a few active agitating disciples, that animals, and even plants, may pass into each other.

"I think we are not wholly brain,
Magnetic mockeries; ...
Not only cunning casts in clay;
Let science prove we are, and then
What matters science unto men,
At least to me! I would not stay:
Let him, the wiser man who springs
Hereafter, up from childhood shape
His action, like the greater ape,
But I was born to other things."

--_In Memoriam_, cxix.

Darwin and Huxley cannot change nature. They may change their minds and opinions, as their fathers did before them. It is, we suspect, only the old heathen materialism cropping out,--

"Our little systems have their day--
They have their day and cease to be.
They are but broken lights of Thee,
And Thou, O Lord! art more than they."

--_In Memoriam._

No artists or authors have ever pictured or described monkeys like Sir Edwin Landseer and his brother Thomas. Surely a new edition of the _Monkeyana_ is wanted for the rising generation. Oliver Goldsmith, that great writer, who was most feeble in knowledge of natural history from almost total ignorance of the subject, over which he threw the graces of his charming style, noticed, as remarkable, that in countries "where the men are barbarous and stupid, the brutes are the most active and sagacious." He continues, that it is in the torrid tracts, inhabited by barbarians, that animals are found with instinct so nearly approaching reason. Both in Africa and America, accordingly, he tells us, "the savages suppose monkeys to be men; idle, slothful, rational beings, capable of speech and conversation, but obstinately dumb, for fear of being compelled to labour."

For the present, I shall suppose that the gorilla, largest of all the apes, can not only speak, but write; and is speaking and writing to an orang-utan of Borneo. Even a Lamarckian will allow this to be within the range of possibility. Were it possible to get Gay or Cowper to write a new set of fables, animals, in the days of postoffices and letters, would become, like the age, epistolary. But a word on the imaginary correspondent.

The orang, as the reader knows, is the great red-haired "Man of the Woods," as the name may be rendered in English. My old friend, Mr Alfred Wallace, lately in New Guinea, and the adjoining parts, collecting natural history subjects, and making all kinds of valuable observations and surveys, sent to Europe most of the magnificent specimens of this "ugly beast" now in the museum. He has detailed its habits and history in an able account, published some years ago in "The Annals and Magazine of Natural History."

Its home seems to be the fine forests which cover many parts of the coast of Borneo. The home of the gorilla and chimpanzee are in the tropical forests of the coasts of Western Africa.

There would seem to be but three or four well established _species_ of these apes, though there are, as in man and most created beings, some marked or decided varieties. These apes are altogether _quadrupeds_, adapted for a life among trees. The late Charles Waterton, of Walton Hall, whom I deem it an honour to have known for many years, personally and in his writings, has well shown this in his "Essays on Natural History." Professor Owen, with his osteologies, and old Tyson, with his anatomies, have each demonstrated that--draw what inferences the followers of Mr Darwin may choose--monkeys are not men, but quadrupeds.

The structure of chimpanzee, orang, and gorilla considerably resembles that of man, but so more distantly does a frog's, so does Scheuchzer's fossil amphibian in the museum, so does a squirrel's, so does a parrot's. Yet, because parrots, squirrels, frogs, and asses have skulls, a pelvis, and fore-arms, they are _not_ men any more than fish are. Linnaeus has given the _real_ specific, the _real_ class, order, and generic character of man, unique as a species, as a genus, as an order, or as a class, as even the greatest comparative anatomist of England regards him; "Nosce teipsum:" "[Greek: Gnothi seauton]"--KNOW THYSELF. Man alone expects a hereafter. He is immortal, and anticipates, hopes for, or dreads a resurrection. Melancholy it is that he alone, as an American writer curiously remarks, collects bodies of men of _one_ blood to fight with each other. He alone can become a _drunkard_.

The reader must leave rhapsody, and may now be reminded, in explanation of allusions in the following letter, that the arm of Dr Livingstone, the African traveller, was crushed and crunched by the bite and "chaw" of a lion. He will also please to notice, that the skeleton of the gorilla in the museum has the left arm broken by some dreadful accident. This injury may _possibly_ have been caused by a fall when young, or more probably by the empoisoned bite of a larger gorilla, or of a tree-climbing Leopard. So much may be premised before giving a letter, supposed to be intercepted on its way between the Gaboon and London, and London and Borneo, opened at St Martin's-le-Grand, and detained as unpaid.

"I was born in a large baobab tree, on the west coast of Africa, not very far from Calabar. We gorillas are good time-keepers, rise early and go to bed early, guided infallibly by the sun. But though our family has been in existence at least six thousand years, we have no chronology, and care not a straw about our grandfathers. I suppose I had a grandmother, but I never took _any_ interest in any but very close relationships.

"We never toiled for our daily food, and are not idle like these lazy black fellows who hold their palavers near us, and whom I, for my part, heartily despise. They cannot climb a tree, as we do, although they can talk to each other, and make one another slaves. At least they so treat their countrymen far off where the fine sweet plantains grow, and some other juicy tit-bits, the memory of which makes my mouth water. These fellows have ugly wives, not nearly so big-mouthed as ours, without our noble bony ridge, small ears, and exalted presence. They are actually forced to walk erect, and their fore-legs seldom touch the ground, except in the case of piccanninies. These little creatures crawl on the ground, are much paler when born, and are then perfectly helpless; and have no hair except on their heads, whereas our beautiful young are fine and hairy, and can swing among the branches, shortly after birth, nearly as well as their parents. When I was very young, I could soon help myself to fruits which abound on our trees.

"Have you dates, plantains, and soursops--so sweet--at Sarawak, Master Redhair? We have, and all kinds of them. I should like, for a variety, to taste yours. Mind you send me some of the _durian_.[6] Make haste and send it, for Wallace's description makes my mouth water.

"I have told you our little ones soon learn to help themselves, whereas I have seen the piccaninnies of the blacks nursed by their mothers till many rainy seasons had come and gone. I really think nothing of the talking blacks who live near us. They put on bits of coloured rags, not nearly so bright, so regular, nor so _contrasting_ as the feathers of our birds.

"Beautifully coloured are the green touraco and the purple plantain-eater, a rascally bird! who eats some of our finest plantains, and has bitten holes in many a one I thought to get entirely to myself. Why, our parrots beat these West-African negroes to sticks! Even our common gray parrot, so prettily scaled with gray, and with the red feathers under his tail, is more natural than these blacks, with their dirty-white, yellow, blue, green, and red rags.

"Besides, that gray parrot beats them hollow both in its voice and in the way it imitates. Do you know that when I have been giving my quick short bark, to tell that I am not well pleased, I have heard one of these fellows near me actually make me startle--its bark was so like to that of one of our kind! I cannot bear the blacks! I have had a grudge against them since some little urchins shot at me when I was young, and made my hand bleed. How it bled! My mother, with whom I had been, kept out of the way of these blackguards, but I was playing with another little gorilla, and forgot to keep a look-out. I have kept a good look-out ever since I got _that_ wound, I assure you. I licked it often, and so did my mother with her delicious mouth. It soon left off bleeding and healed. We gorillas have no brandy, no whisky, no wine, not even small beer, to inflame our blood. We sleep, too, among the trees, clear off the ground, where there are dangerous vapours, so that we are free from all miasmata. West Africa is my lovely home, and I am big and beautifully pot-bellied. It is the home of the large-eared chimpanzee, a near relative of ours, though we never marry. He is an active fellow, with rather large vulgar-looking ears; while mine, though I ought not to say so, are beautifully small, and denote my more exalted birth. Master Chimpanzee needs all his ears, for he is not so strong as I, and as you will hear, we anthropoids have enemies in our trees, just as you perhaps have, Master Redhair. We are both cautious of getting on the ground, and when there, I assure you I keep a sharp look-out.

"I have told you of one adventure I had in my youth, and now listen to another which I have not forgotten to this day. My left arm aches now as I think of it.

"As I was one day gambolling with another playfellow in a large tree, with great branches standing out from the trunk, and at a good height from the ground, my companion, another young gorilla, but with smaller mouth, larger nose, and other features uglier than mine, suddenly shrieked, and looked frightened and angry. No sooner had I noticed him than my whole frame was shaken. I was seized by two paws in the small of my back--a very painful part to be dug into--by ten hooked claws, nearly as long as tenpenny nails, but horribly sharp and hooked.--Oh my arm!

"I tried to turn round, and there was a most ferocious leopard growling at me. I tried to bite, and to scratch his eyes out, but the pain in the small of my back made me quite giddy. The spotted scoundrel seized my left arm--how it aches!--and gave me a _crunch_ or two. I hear, I feel the teeth against my bones as I write. My whole body is full of pain.

"My mother came and released me. She was large, handsome, and well-to-do, with _such_ long and strong arms, and with a magnificent bulging and pouting mouth. In those days of my infancy I used to fancy I should like to try to take as large a bite of a plantain as she could. I tried twice or thrice, but could only squash a tenth of the juice of the fruit into my mouth. She had glorious white teeth. Her grin clearly frightened the leopard, as well as a pinch she gave him in the 'scruff' of the neck with one of her hands, while with the other she caught hold of his tail and made him yell. How he roared! He fell off the branch on to another; but soon, like all the cats, recovered his hold and jumped down to the ground, when he skulked away with his tail behind him.

"I must really leave off, warned both by my paper and your impatience. Well, I grew stronger and bigger every day, and swung by one arm almost as well as the rest did with their two. I got, in fact, so strong on my hind feet, that my toes were actually in time thicker than those of any of my race. It is well, my dear Orang, to use what you have left you, and to try as soon as possible to forget what has been taken from you.

"... Look at my portrait, I am as strong, and as bony, and as bonnie, as any gorilla. But I begin to boast, so I will leave off."

* * * * *

No doubt that gorilla's injured arm affected its habits and its activity every day of its life. The broken arm, never set by some gorilla surgeon of celebrity, formed a highly important feature in its biography. Reader! when next thou visitest the noble Museum in Bloomsbury, look at the skeleton of that gorilla, whose probable story Arachnophilus hath tried to give thee, and remember that both skin and skeleton were exhibited there before Du Chaillu became "a lion."

The gorilla is a native of West Africa. It is closely allied to the chimpanzee, but grows to a larger size, and has many striking anatomical characters and external marks to distinguish it. It is certainly much dreaded by the natives on the banks of the Gaboon, and, doubtless, dreads them equally. Dr Gray procured a large specimen in a tub from that district. It was skinned and set up by Mr Bartlett. I have seen photographs in the hands of my excellent old friend--that admirable natural history and anatomical draughtsman--Mr George Ford of Hatton Garden. These photographs were taken from its truly ugly face as it was pulled out of the stinking brine. Life in death, or death in life, it was most repulsive.

Professor Owen read a most elaborate paper on the gorilla before the Zoological Society. The great comparative anatomist and zoologist shows that it _may_ have been the very species whose skins were brought by Hanno to Carthage, in times before the Christian era, as the skins of _hairy wild men_. The historian refers to them as "gorullai" ([Greek: Goryllai].)

The natives of West Africa name it "N'Geena."

* * * * *

The stuffed specimen at the Museum is a young male. Its preparation does great credit to Mr Bartlett's care and knowledge, for the hair over nearly all the body was in patches among the spirit--thoroughly corrupted in its alcoholic strength by animal matter. The peculiarly anthropoid and morbidly-disagreeable look that even the face of the young gorilla had was, of course, perfect in the photograph. In the _Leisure Hour_, a tolerably good cut of it was given, but the artist did not copy the label accurately, for on the photograph from which that cut was derived, _another name_ was rendered by _that_ sun, who pays no compliments and tells no lies. Professor Owen, the greatest of comparative anatomists, has made the subject of anthropoid apes his own, by the perfection of his researches, continued and continuous. He would have liked, at least I may venture, I believe, to say so (if the matter gave him more than a moment's thought), that the name of Dr Gray had been on that label.

_Letter from C. Waterton, Esq., mentioning a young gorilla._

WALTON HALL, _Feb_. 4, 1856.

"DEAR SIR,--As your favour of the 28th did not seem to require an immediate answer I put it aside for a while, having a multiplicity of business then on hand, and being obliged to be from home for a couple of days.

"I beg to enclose you the letter to which you allude.

"Pray do not suppose that for one single moment I should be illiberal enough to undervalue a 'closet naturalist.' 'Non cuivis homini contingit adire corinthum.' It does not fall to every one's lot to range through the forests of Guiana, still, a gentleman given to natural history may do wonders for it in his own apartments on his native soil; and had Audubon, Swainson, Jameson, &c., not attacked me in all the pride of pompous self-conceit, I should have been the last man in the world to expose their gross ignorance.

"You ask me 'If we are to have another volume of essays?' I beg to answer, no. Last year, Mrs Loudon (to whom I made a present of the essays) wrote to me, and asked for a few papers to be inserted in a forthcoming edition. I answered, that as I had had some strange and awful adventures since the 'Autobiography' made its appearance, I would tack them on to it. But from that time to this, I have never had a line, either from Mrs Loudon or from her publishers. But some months ago, having made a present of a superb case of preserved specimens in natural history to the Jesuits' College in Lancashire, I gave directions to my stationer at Wakefield to procure me from London the fourth or last edition of the essays; and I made references to it accordingly. But, lo and behold, when I had opened this supposed fourth edition, I saw printed on the title page 'a new edition.' Better had they printed a _fifth edition_. This threw all my references wrong. Should you be passing by Messrs Longman, perhaps you will have the goodness to ask when this 'new edition' was printed.

"I am sorry you did not show me your drawing of the chimpanzee before it was engraved. The artist has not done justice to it. He has made the ears far too large.[7] The little brown chimpanzee has very small ears; fully as small in proportion as those of a genuine negro. I am half inclined to give to the world a little treatise on the monkey tribe. I am prepared to show that Linnaeus, Buffon, and all our hosts of naturalists who have copied the remarks of these celebrated naturalists, are perfectly in the dark with regard to the true character of _all_ the monkey tribe. Yesterday, I sent up to the _Gardener's Chronicle_ a few notes on the woodpecker.--Believe me, dear sir, very truly yours,

CHARLES WATERTON.

"P.S.--Many thanks for your nice little treatise on the chimpanzee."

Mr Waterton enclosed me a copy of the following letter, which he published in a Yorkshire newspaper:--

_To Mrs Wombwell._

"MADAM,--I am truly sorry that the inclemency of the weather has prevented the inhabitants of this renowned watering-place from visiting your wonderful gorilla, or brown orang-outang.

"I have passed two hours in its company, and I have been gratified beyond expression.

"Would that all lovers of natural history could get a sight of it, as, possibly, they may never see another of the same species in this country.

"It differs widely in one respect from all other orang-outangs which have been exhibited in England--namely, that, when on the ground, it never walks on the soles of its fore-feet, but on the knuckles of the toes of those feet; and those toes are doubled up like the closed fist of a man. This must be a painful position; and, to relieve itself, the animal catches hold of visitors, and clings caressingly to Miss Bright, who exhibits it. Here then, it is at rest, with the toes of the fore-feet performing their natural functions, which they never do when the animal is on the ground.

"Hence I draw the conclusion that this singular quadruped, like the sloth, is not a walker on the ground of its own free-will, but by accident only.

"No doubt whatever it is born, and lives, and dies aloft, amongst the trees in the forests of Africa.

"Put it on a tree, and then it will immediately have the full use of the toes of its fore-feet. Place it on the ground, and then you will see that the toes of the fore-feet become useless, as I have already described.

"That it may retain its health, and thus remunerate you for the large sum which you have expended in the purchase of it, is, madam, the sincere hope of your obedient servant and well-wisher,

CHARLES WATERTON."

Scarborough Cliff, No. 1, _Nov. 1, 1855_.

"_P.S._--You are quite at liberty to make what use you choose of this letter. I have written it for your own benefit, and for the good of natural history."[8]

MR MITCHELL ON A YOUNG CHIMPANZEE.

The writer of a most readable article on the acclimatisation of animals in the _Edinburgh Review_,[9] gives an amusing recital of the arrival of a chimpanzee at the Zoological Gardens. It was related to him by the late Mr Mitchell, who was long the active secretary of the society, and who did much to improve the Gardens. "One damp November evening, just before dusk, there arrived a French traveller from Senegal, with a companion closely muffled up in a burnoose at his side. On going, at his earnest request, to speak to him at the gate, he communicated to me the interesting fact that the stranger in the burnoose was a young chim, who had resided in his family in Senegal for some twelve months, and who had accompanied him to England. The animal was in perfect health; but from the state of the atmosphere required good lodging, and more tender care than could be found in a hotel. He proposed to sell his friend. I was hard; did not like pulmonic property[10] at that period of the year, having already two of the race in moderate health, but could not refrain from an offer of hospitality during Chim's residence in London. Chim was to go to Paris if I did not buy him. So we carried him, burnoose and all, into the house where the lady chims were, and liberated him in the doorway. They had taken tea, and were beginning to think of their early couch. When the Senegal Adonis caught sight of them, he assumed a jaunty air and advanced with politeness, as if to offer them the last news from Africa. A yell of surprise burst from each chimpanzella as they successively recognised the unexpected arrival. One would have supposed that all the Billingsgate of Chimpanzeedom rolled from the voluble tongues of these unsophisticated and hitherto unimpressible young ladies; but probably their gesticulations, their shrill exclamations, their shrinkings, their threats, were but well-mannered expressions of welcome to a countryman thus abruptly revealed in the foreign land of their captivity. Sir Chim advanced undaunted, and with the composure of a high-caste pongo; if he had had a hat he would have doffed it incontinently, as it was, he only slid out of his burnoose and ascended into the apartment which adjoined his countrywomen with agile grace, and then, through the transparent separation, he took a closer view. Juliana yelled afresh. Paquita crossed her hands, and sat silently with face about three quarters averted. Sir Chim uttered what may have been a tranquillising phrase, expressive of the great happiness he felt on thus being suddenly restored to the presence of kinswomen in the moment of his deepest bereavement. Juliana calmed. Paquita diminished her angle of aversion, and then Sir Chim, advancing quite close to the division, began what appeared to be a recollection of a minuet. He executed marvellous gestures with a precision and aplomb which were quite enchanting, and when at last he broke out into a quick movement with loud smacking stamps, the ladies were completely carried away, and gave him all attention. Friendship was established, refreshments were served, notwithstanding the previous tea, and everybody was apparently satisfied, especially the stranger. Upon asking the Senegal proprietor what the dance meant, he told me that the animal had voluntarily taken to that imitation of his slaves, who used to dance every evening in the courtyard."

So far Mr Mitchell's narrative; the reviewer relates how a chimpanzee, placed for a short time in the society of the children of his owner in this country, not only throve in an extraordinary manner, was perfectly docile and good-tempered, but learnt to imitate them. When the eldest little boy wished to tease his playfellow, he used, childlike, to make faces at him. Chim soon outdid him, and one of the funniest things imaginable was to see him blown at and blowing in return; his protrusible lips converted themselves into a trumpet-shaped instrument, which reminded one immediately of some of the devils of Albert Duerer, or those incredible forms which the old painters used to delight in piling together in their temptations of Saint Anthony.

LADY ANNE BARNARD PLEADS FOR THE BABOONS.