Addressed by Dr. Jenner, in 1810, to a Lady who asked him if he thought
it would rain to-morrow.
The hollow winds begin to blow,
The clouds look black, the glass is low:
The soot falls down, the spaniels sleep,
And spiders from their cobwebs creep:
Last night the sun went pale to bed,
The moon in halos hid her head:
The boding shepherd heaves a sigh,
For see, a rainbow spans the sky;
The walls are damp, the ditches smell,
Closed is the pink-eyed pimpernel;
The squalid toads at dusk were seen
Slowly crawling o’er the green;
Loud quack the ducks, the peacocks cry,
The distant hills are looking nigh;
Hark, how the chairs and tables crack,
Old Betty’s joints are on the rack;
And see yon rooks, how odd their flight,
They imitate the gliding kite,
Or seem precipitate to fall
As if they felt the piercing ball;
How restless are the snorting swine,
The busy flies disturb the kine,
Low o’er the grass the swallow wings,
The cricket too, how loud she sings,
Puss on the hearth with velvet paws
Sits wiping o’er her whisker’d jaws:--
’Twill surely rain, I see, with sorrow,
Our jaunt must be put off to-morrow.
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Footnote 3:
Every Man out of his Humour; Act iii. Scene 7.
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THE BRITISH MUSEUM.--No. 4.
[Illustration: The Musk-Ox.]
We shall occasionally turn aside from the monuments of Art in the
British Museum to notice some of the specimens in the collection of
Natural History. Stuffed skins and skeletons are, of course, much less
interesting, both to the scientific student of zoology and to the
ordinary observer, than the living animal, retaining his natural habits,
as far as they can be preserved, in a menagerie. But, at the same time,
a stuffed skin affords a much better notion of the animated creature
than the best drawing; and, in some cases, the living specimen cannot be
procured, or kept alive, in this country. In such cases we are compelled
to resort to such preserved specimens as that of the _musk-ox_, on the
great staircase of the Museum.
This specimen is very faithfully represented in the above wood-cut. The
animal, of which this skin was once a part, was shot by some of the
persons accompanying Captain Parry, in one of his expeditions to the
Polar Seas; and was presented to the Museum by the Lords of the
Admiralty. The appearance of the musk-ox, as the visitor will observe,
is strikingly different from that of the common black cattle of Great
Britain. Its limbs are singularly short,--its crooked horns are broad
and flattened,--long thick hair covers the whole of its trunk, hanging
down nearly to the ground,--and its short tail, bending inwards, is
entirely hidden by the long hair of the rump and hind quarters. It will
be noticed that the hair is particularly thick under the throat, looking
something like a horse’s mane inverted. The adaptation of the structure
of this animal to the frozen regions which he inhabits, offers one of
the most striking illustrations of design which the natural world
exhibits. The shortness of the creature’s limbs prevents that exposure
of the trunk to the snow-storms and the cold, which would result from a
greater elevation; whilst he is more effectually protected from the
severity of the seasons by the dense mass of hair with which his whole
body is covered, and which, in winter, becomes a thick woolly coat,
beneath the long straight hair which forms his outer garment. The Author
of the Appendix to Parry’s Second Voyage, in noticing the remarkable
projection of the orbits of the eyes in this species, considers that
their formation is necessary to carry the eye of the animal clear beyond
the large quantity of hair required to preserve the warmth of the head.
Thus protected from the inclemency of winter cold, the musk-ox remains
the contented and happy inhabitant of the most barren and desolate parts
of the earth. Within the Arctic Circle, in those almost inaccessible
regions which lie nearest the North Pole, large herds of these
quadrupeds are found, appearing to derive as much enjoyment from
existence as the cattle who graze on the most luxuriant pastures,
beneath a genial sky. They are not often found at a great distance from
woods; but when they feed upon open grounds they prefer the most
precipitous situations, climbing amidst rocks with all the agility and
precision of the mountain-goat or the chamois. Grass, when they can get
it, moss, twigs of willow, and pine shoots, constitute their food. The
parts of the polar regions inhabited by the musk-ox are thus described
in the Appendix to Parry’s Second Voyage:--
“This species of ox inhabits the North Georgian Islands in the summer
months. They arrived in Melville Island in the middle of May, crossing
the ice from the southward, and quitted it on their return towards the
end of September. The musk-ox may be further stated, on Esquimaux
information, to inhabit the country on the west of Davis’ Strait, and on
the north of Baffin’s Bay; as a head and horns and a drawing of a bull
being shown to the Esquimaux of the west coast of Davis’ Strait who were
communicated with on the 7th of September, were immediately recognized,
and the animal called by the name of Umingmack. This is evidently the
same with the Umimak of the Esquimaux of Wolstenholme Sound, who were
visited by the former expedition, and of which nothing more could be
learnt at the time from their description than that it was a large
horned animal inhabiting the land, and certainly not a rein-deer. It is
probable that the individuals which extend their summer migration to the
north-east of Baffin’s Bay, retire during the winter to the continent of
America, or to its neighbourhood, as the species is unknown in South
Greenland.”
Captain Franklin, in his Journey to the Polar Sea, has given the
following account of the habits of this species:--
“The musk-oxen, like the buffalo, herd together in bands, and generally
frequent barren grounds during the summer months, keeping near the
rivers, but retire to the woods in winter. They seem to be less watchful
than most other wild animals, and when grazing are not difficult to
approach, provided the hunters go against the wind. When two or three
men get so near a herd as to fire at them from different points, these
animals, instead of separating or running away, huddle closer together,
and several are generally killed; but if the wound is not mortal they
become enraged, and dart in the most furious manner at the hunters, who
must be very dexterous to evade them. They can defend themselves by
their powerful horns against wolves and bears, which, as the Indians
say, they not unfrequently kill. The musk-oxen feed on the same
substances with the rein-deer, and the prints of the feet of these two
animals are so much alike, that it requires the eye of an experienced
hunter to distinguish them. The largest killed by us did not exceed in
weight three hundred pounds. The flesh has a musky disagreeable flavour,
particularly when the animal is lean, which unfortunately for us was the
case with all that we now killed,”
The bulls of this species killed during Parry’s second voyage weighed,
upon an average, about 700 lbs., yielding about 400 lbs. of meat; and
they stood about 10½ hands high at the withers.
On the staircase of the Museum are also stuffed specimens of a male and
female Giraffe, or Camelopard, which were presented to the Museum by Mr.
Burchell, the traveller in Africa. The living giraffe which was
presented to George IV. in 1827, by the Pacha of Egypt, died in 1829.
The other giraffe sent to the government of France, in 1827, is still
living in the Jardin des Plantes, at Paris. It is impossible from a
studied specimen to form an adequate idea of the grace and beauty of
this remarkable animal; nor of the impression produced upon the senses
by a creature of such enormous height lifting up its head to gather the
tender leaves from branches three times as high as a tall man. Till the
living giraffes were brought to England and France there was a general
belief that the descriptions of this animal were partly fabulous. It is
now established that the account which was given of this animal by Le
Vaillant, one of the most amusing of travellers, who saw the animal in
its native woods, is perfectly accurate. We copy the following
description from his Second Voyage, as translated in ‘The Menageries,’
Vol. I.:--
“The giraffe ruminates, as every animal does that possesses, at the same
time, horns and cloven feet. It grazes also in the same way; but not
often, because the country which it inhabits has little pasturage. Its
ordinary food is the leaf of a sort of mimosa, called by the natives
_kanaap_, and by the colonists, _kameeldoorn_. This tree being only
found in the country of the Namaquas, may probably afford a reason why
the giraffe is there fixed, and why he is not seen in those regions of
Southern Africa where the tree does not grow.
[Illustration: The Giraffe.]
“Doubtless the most beautiful part of his body is the head. The mouth is
small; the eyes are brilliant and full. Between the eyes, and above the
nose is a swelling, very prominent and well defined. This prominence is
not a fleshy excrescence, but an enlargement of the bony substance; and
it seems to be similar to the two little lumps, or protuberances, with
which the top of his head is armed, and which, being about the size of a
hen’s egg, spring, on each side, at the commencement of the mane. His
tongue is rough, and terminates in a point. The two jaws have, on each
side, six molar teeth; but the lower jaw has, beyond these, eight
incisive teeth, while the upper jaw has none.
“The hoofs, which are cleft, and have no nails, resemble those of the
ox. We may remark, at first sight, that those of the fore feet are
larger than those of the hind. The leg is very slender, but the knees
have a prominence, because the animal kneels when he lies down.
“If I had not myself killed the giraffe, I should have believed, as have
many naturalists, that the fore legs are much longer than the hind. This
is an error; for the legs have, in general, the proportion of those of
other quadrupeds. I say in general, because in this genus there are
varieties, as there are in animals of the same species.... His defence,
as that of the horse and other hoofed animals, consists in kicks; and
his hinder limbs are so light, and his blows so rapid, that the eye
cannot follow them. They are sufficient for his defence against the
lion. He never employs his horns in resisting any attack.... The
giraffes, male and female, resemble each other in their exterior, in
their youth. Their obtuse horns are then terminated by a knot of long
hair: the female preserves this peculiarity some time, but the male
loses it at the age of three years. The hide, which is at first of a
light red, becomes of a deeper colour as the animal advances in age, and
is at length of a yellow brown in the female, and of a brown approaching
to black in the male. By this difference of colour the male may be
distinguished from the female at a distance. The skin varies in both
sexes, as to the distribution and form of the spots. The female is not
so high as the male, and the prominence of the front is not so marked.
She has four teats. According to the account of the natives, she goes
with young about twelve months, and has one at a birth.”
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