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.
Lady Anne Barnard, whose name as the writer of "Auld Robin Gray" is
familiar to every one who knows that most pathetic ballad, spent five
years with her husband at the Cape (1797-1802). Her journal letters to
her sisters are most amusing, and full of interesting observations.[11]
After describing "Musquito-hunting" with her husband, she writes:--"In
return, I endeavoured to effect a treaty of peace for the baboons, who
are apt to come down from the mountain in little troops to pillage our
garden of the fruit with which the trees are loaded. I told him he would
be worse than Don Carlos if he refused the children of the sun and the
soil the use of what had descended from ouran-outang to ouran-outang;
but, alas! I could not succeed. He had pledged himself to the
gardener,[12] to the slaves, and all the dogs, not to baulk them of
their sport; so he shot a superb man-of-the-mountain one morning, who
was marauding, and electrified himself the same moment, so shocked was
he at the groan given by the poor creature as he limped off the ground.
I do not think I shall hear of another falling a sacrifice to Barnard's
gun; they come too near the human race" (p. 408).
In another letter she says (p. 391), "The best way to get rid of them is
to catch one, whip him, and turn him loose; he skips off chattering to
his comrades, and is extremely angry, but none of them return the season
this is done. I have given orders, however, that there may be no
whipping."
S. BISSET AND HIS TRAINED MONKEYS.
We have elsewhere referred to S. Bisset as a trainer of animals. Among
the earliest of his trials, this Scotchman took two monkeys as pupils.
One of these he taught to dance and tumble on the rope, whilst the other
held a candle with one paw for his companion, and with the other played
a barrel organ. These animals he also instructed to play several
fanciful tricks, such as drinking to the company, riding and tumbling
upon a horse's back, and going through several regular dances with a
dog. The horse and dog referred to, were the first animals on which this
ingenious person tried his skill. Although Bisset lived in the last
century, few persons seem to have surpassed him in his power of teaching
the lower animals. We have seen a man in Charlotte Square, in 1865, make
a new-world monkey go through a series of tricks, ringing a bell, firing
a pea-gun, and such like. Poor Jacko was to be pitied. His want of heart
in his labours was very evident. Poor fellow, no time for reflection was
allowed him. Like some of the masters in the Old High School,--such
cruelty dates back more than thirty years,--a ferule, or a pair of tawse
kept Jacko to his work. It was play to the onlookers, but no sport to
master Cebus. Had he possessed memory and reflection, how his thoughts
must have wandered from Edinburgh to the forests of the Amazon!
LORD BYRON'S PETS.
Beside horses and dogs, the poet Byron, like his own Don Juan, had a
kind of inclination, or weakness, for what most people deem mere vermin,
_live animals_.
Captain Medwin records, in one of his conversations, that the poet
remarked that it was troublesome to travel about with so much live and
dead stock as he did, and adds--"I don't like to leave behind me any of
my pets, that have been accumulating since I came on the Continent. One
cannot trust to strangers to take care of them. You will see at the
farmer's some of my pea-fowls _en pension_. Fletcher tells me that they
are almost as bad fellow-travellers as the monkey, which I will show
you." Here he led the way to a room where he played with and caressed
the creature for some time. He afterwards bought another monkey in Pisa,
because he saw it ill-used.[13]
Lord Byron's travelling equipage to Pisa in the autumn of 1821,
consisted, _inter caetera_, of nine horses, a monkey, a bull-dog, and a
mastiff, two cats, three pea-fowls, and some hens.[14]
THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD'S MONKEY.
(_From the "Noctes Ambrosianae," Dec. 1825._[15])
_Shepherd._ I wish that you but saw my monkey, Mr North. He would make
you hop the twig in a guffaw. I ha'e got a pole erected for him, o'
about some 150 feet high, on a knowe ahint Mount Benger; and the way the
cretur rins up to the knob, looking ower the shouther o' him, and
twisting his tail roun' the pole for fear o' playin' thud on the grun',
is comical past a' endurance.
_North._ Think you, James, that he is a link?
_Shepherd._ A link in creation? Not he, indeed. He is merely a monkey.
Only to see him on his observatory, beholding the sunrise! or weeping,
like a Laker, at the beauty o' the moon and stars!
_North._ Is he a bit of a poet?
_Shepherd._ Gin he could but speak and write, there can be nae manner o'
doubt that he would be a gran' poet. Safe us! what een in the head o'
him! Wee, clear, red, fiery, watery, malignant-lookin een, fu' o'
inspiration.
_Tickler._ You should have him stuffed.
_Shepherd._ Stuffed, man! say, rather, embalmed. But he's no likely to
dee for years to come--indeed, the cretur's engaged to be married;
although he's no in the secret himsel yet. The bawns are published.
_Tickler._ Why really, James, marriage I think ought to be simply a
civil contract.
_Shepherd._ A civil contract! I wuss it was. But, oh! Mr Tickler, to see
the cretur sittin wi' a pen in 's hand, and pipe in 's mouth, jotting
down a sonnet, or odd, or lyrical ballad! Sometimes I put that black
velvet cap ye gied me on his head, and ane o' the bairns's auld
big-coats on his back; and then, sure aneugh, when he takes his stroll
in the avenue, he is a heathenish Christian.
_North._ Why, James, by this time he must be quite like one of the
family?
_Shepherd._ He's a capital flee-fisher. I never saw a monkey throw a
lighter line in my life.... Then, for rowing a boat!
_Tickler._ Why don't you bring him to Ambrose's?
_Shepherd._ He's sae bashfu'. He never shines in company; and the least
thing in the world will make him blush.
THE FINDHORN FISHERMAN AND THE MONKEY.
Sir Thomas Dick Lauder[16] records the adventures of a monkey in
Morayshire, whose wanderings sadly alarmed the inhabitants who saw him,
all unused as they were to the sight of such an exotic stranger.
"We knew a large monkey, which escaped from his chain, and was abroad in
Morayshire for some eight or ten days. Wherever he appeared he spread
terror among the peasantry. A poor fisherman on the banks of the
Findhorn was sitting with his wife and family at their frugal meal, when
a hairy little man, as they in their ignorance conceived him to be,
appeared on the window sill and grinned, and chattered through the
casement what seemed to them to be the most horrible incantations.
Horror-struck, the poor people crowded together on their knees on the
floor, and began to exorcise him with prayers most vehemently, until
some external cause of alarm made their persecutor vanish. The
neighbours found the family half dead with fear, and could with
difficulty extract from them the cause. 'Oh! worthy neebours!' at last
exclaimed the goodman with a groan, 'we ha'e seen the _Enemy_ glowrin'
at us through that vera wundow there. Lord keep us a'!!' He next alarmed
a little hamlet near the hills; appearing and disappearing to various
individuals in a most mysterious manner; till at last a clown, with a
few grains of more courage than the rest, loaded his gun and put a
sixpence into it, with the intention of stealing upon him as he sat most
mysteriously chattering on the top of a cairn of stones, and then
shooting him with silver, which is known never to fail in finishing the
imps of the Evil One. And lucky indeed was it for pug that he chanced,
through whim, to abscond from that quarter; for if he had not so
disappeared, he might have died by the lead, if not by the silver. As it
was, the bold peasant laid claim to the full glory of compelling this
dreaded goblin to flee."
Sir Thomas Lauder kept several pets in his beautiful seat at the Grange,
long occupied by the Messrs Dalgleish of Dreghorn Castle as a genteel
boarding-school, and now by the Misses Mouatt as one for young ladies.
We have often seen the tombstones to his dogs, which were buried to the
south of that mansion, in which Principal Robertson the historian died,
and where Lord Brougham, his relation, used to go when a boy at the High
School.
THE FRENCH MARQUIS AND HIS MONKEY.
Dr John Moore, the father of General Moore, who fell at Corunna, in one
of the graphic sketches of a Frenchman which he gives in his work on
Italy, records a visit he paid to the Marquis de F---- at Besancon.
After many questions, he says, "Before I could make any answer, I
chanced to turn my eyes upon a person whom I had not before observed,
who sat very gravely upon a chair in a corner of the room, with a large
periwig in full dress upon his head. The marquis, seeing my surprise at
the sight of this unknown person, after a very hearty fit of laughter,
begged pardon for not having introduced me sooner to that gentleman (who
was no other than a large monkey), and then told me, he had the honour
of being attended by a physician, who had the reputation of possessing
the greatest skill, and who _certainly_ wore the largest periwigs of any
doctor in the province. That one morning, while he was writing a
prescription at his bedside, this same monkey had catched hold of his
periwig by one of the knots, and instantly made the best of his way out
at the window to the roof of a neighbouring house, from which post he
could not be dislodged, till the doctor, having lost patience, had sent
home for another wig, and never after could be prevailed on to accept of
this, which had been so much disgraced. That, _enfin_, his valet, to
whom the monkey belonged, had, ever since that adventure, obliged the
culprit by way of punishment to sit quietly, for an hour every morning,
with the periwig on his head.--Et pendant ces moments de tranquillite je
suis honore de la societe du venerable personage. Then, addressing
himself to the monkey, "Adieu, mon ami, pour aujourdhui--au plaisir de
vous revoir;" and the servant immediately carried Monsieur le Medicin
out of the room.[17]
This is a most characteristic bit, which could scarcely have occurred
out of France, where monkeys and dogs are petted as we never saw them
petted elsewhere. These things were so when we knew Paris under
Louis-Philippe. Frenchmen, surely, have not much changed under Louis
Napoleon.
THE MANDRILL AND GEORGE THE FOURTH.
One of the attractive sights of Mr Cross's menagerie, some forty years
or so ago, was a full-grown baboon, to which had been given the name of
"Happy Jerry." He was conspicuous from the finely-coloured rib-like
ridges on each side of his cheeks, the clear blue and scarlet hue of
which, on such a hideous long face and muzzle, with its small,
deeply-sunk malicious eyes, and projecting brow and cheeks, seemed
almost as if beauty and bestiality were here combined. But Jerry had a
habit which would have made Father Matthew loathe him and those who
encouraged him. He had been taught to sit in an armchair and to drink
porter out of a pot, like a thirsty brickmaker; and, as an addition to
his accomplishments, he could also smoke a pipe, like a trained pupil of
Sir Walter Raleigh. This rib-nosed baboon, or mandrill, as he is often
called, obtained great renown; and among other distinguished personages
who wished to see him was his late majesty King George the Fourth. As
that king seldom during his reign frequented places of public resort, Mr
Cross was invited to bring Jerry to Windsor or Brighton, to display the
talents of his redoubtable baboon. I have heard Mr Cross say, that the
king placed his hands on the arm of one of the ladies of the Court, at
which Jerry began to show such unmistakable signs of ferocity, that the
mild, kind menagerist was glad to get Jerry removed, or at least the
king and his courtiers to withdraw. He showed his great teeth and
grinned and growled, as a baboon in a rage is apt to do. Jerry was a
powerful beast, especially in his fore-legs or arms. When he died, Mr
Cross presented his skin to the British Museum, where it has been long
preserved. The mandrill is a native of West Africa, where he is much
dreaded by the negroes.
In Cross's menagerie at Walworth, nearly twenty years ago, there was
generally a fine mandrill. We remember the sulky ferocity of that
restless eye. How angry the mild menagerist used to be at the ladies in
the monkey-room with their parasols! These appendages were the feelers
with which some of the softer sex used to touch Cross's monkeys, and, as
the old gentleman used to insist, helped to kill them. Parasols were
freely used to touch the boas and other snakes feeding in the same warm
room. No doubt a boa-constrictor could not live comfortably if his soft,
muscular sides got fifty pokes a day from as many sticks or parasols.
Edward Cross, mild, gentle, gentlemanly, Prince of show-keepers, used to
be very indignant at the inquisitorial desire possessed, especially by
some of the fairer sex, to try the relative hardness and softness of
serpents and monkeys, and other mammals and creatures. This story of the
mandrill may excuse this pendant of an episode.
THE YOUNG LADY'S PET MONKEY AND HER PARROT.
Horace Walpole tells an anecdote of a fine young French lady, a Madame
de Choiseul. She longed for a parrot that should be a miracle of
eloquence. A parrot was soon found for her in Paris. She also became
enamoured of General Jacko, a celebrated monkey, at Astley's. But the
possessor was so exorbitant in his demand for Jacko, that the General
did not change proprietors. Another monkey was soon heard of, who had
been brought up by a cook in a kitchen, where he had learned to pluck
fowls with inimitable dexterity. This accomplished pet was bought and
presented to Madame, who accepted him. The first time she went out, the
two animals were locked up in her bed-chamber. When the lady returned,
the monkey was alone to be seen. Search, was made for Pretty Poll, and
to her horror she was found at last under bed, shivering and cowering,
and without a feather. It seems that the two pets had been presented by
rival lovers of Madame. Poll's presenter concluded that his rival had
given the monkey with that very view, challenged him; they fought, and
both were wounded: and a heroic adventure it was![18]
MONKEYS POOR RELATIONS.
One of Luttrell's sayings, recorded by Sydney Smith, was,--
"I hate the sight of monkeys, they remind me so of poor relations." Here
follows a fine passage of Sydney Smith, which he might have written
after hearing the lectures of Professor Huxley.[19] "I confess I feel
myself so much at my ease about the superiority of mankind,--I have such
a marked and decided contempt for the understanding of every baboon I
have yet seen,--I feel so sure that the blue ape without a tail will
never rival us in poetry, painting, and music,--that I see no reason
whatever why justice may not be done to the few fragments of soul, and
tatters of understanding, which they may really possess. I have
sometimes, perhaps, felt a little uneasy at Exeter 'Change, from
contrasting the monkeys with the 'prentice boys who are teasing them;
but a few pages of Locke, or a few lines of Milton, have always restored
my tranquillity, and convinced me that the superiority of man had
nothing to fear."[20]
MRS COLIN MACKENZIE OBSERVES APES AT SIMLA.[21]
The monkey she alludes to seems to be the _Semnopithecus Entellus_, a
black-faced, light-haired monkey, with long legs and tail, much
venerated by the Hindoos.
"Mrs L. and I were very much amused, early this morning (July 5), by
watching numbers of huge apes, the size of human beings, with white hair
all round their faces, and down their backs and chests, who were
disporting themselves and feeding on the green leaves, on the sides of
the precipice close to the house. Many of them had one or two little
ones--the most amusing, indefatigable little creatures imaginable--who
were incessantly running up small trees, jumping down again, and
performing all sorts of antics, till one felt quite wearied with their
perpetual activity. When the mother wished to fly, she clutched the
little one under her arm, where, clinging round her body with all its
arms, it remained in safety, while she made leaps of from thirty to
forty feet, and ran at a most astonishing rate down the khad, catching
at any tree or twig that offered itself to any one of her four arms.
There were two old grave apes of enormous size sitting together on the
branch of a tree, and deliberately catching the fleas in each other's
shaggy coats. The patient sat perfectly still, while his brother ape
divided and thoroughly searched his beard and hair, lifted up one arm
and then the other, and turned him round as he thought fit; and then the
patient undertook to perform the same office for his friend."
THE AYE-AYE (_Chiromys Madagascariensis_).
Zoologists used to know a very curious animal from Madagascar, by name,
or by an indifferent specimen preserved in the Paris Museum. Sonnerat,
the naturalist, obtained it from that great island so well known to
geographical boys in former days by its being, so they were told, the
largest island in the world. This strange quadruped was named by a word
which meant "handed-mouse," for such is the signification of _chiromys_,
or _cheiromys_, as it used to be spelled. This creature, when its
history was better known, was believed to be not far removed in the
system from the lemurs and loris. Its soft fur, long tail, large eyes,
and other features and habits connected it with these quadrumana, while
its rodent dentition seemed to refer it to the group containing our
squirrels, hares, and mice. It has been the subject of a profound memoir
by Professor Owen, our greatest comparative anatomist; and I remember,
with pleasure, the last time I saw him at the Museum he was engaged in
its dissection. I may here refer to one of the Professor's lighter
productions--a lecture at Exeter Hall on some instances of the "power of
God as manifested in His animal creation"--for a very nice notice of
this curious quadruped. In one of the French journals, there was an
excellent account given of the peculiar habits of the little nocturnal
creature. In those tropical countries the trees are tenanted by
countless varieties of created things. Their wood affords rich feeding
to the large, fat, pulpy grubs of beetles of the families _Buprestidae_,
_Dynastidae_, _Passalidae_, and, above all, that glorious group the
_Longicornia_. These beetles worm their way into the wood, making often
long tunnels, feeding as they work, and leaving their _ejecta_ in the
shape of agglomerated sawdust. It is into the long holes drilled by
these beetles that the Aye-Aye searches with his long fingers, one of
which, on the fore-hand, is specially thin, slender, and skeleton-like.
It looks like the tool of some lock-picker. Our large-eyed little
friend, like the burglar, comes out at night and finds these holes on
the trees where he slept during the day. His sensitive thin ears, made
to hear every scratch, can detect the rasping of the retired grub,
feasting in apparent security below. Naturalists sometimes hear at
night, so Samouelle once told me, the grubs of moths munching the dewy
leaves. Our aye-aye is no collector, but he has eyes, ears, and fingers
too, that see, hear, and get larvae that, when grown and changed into
beetles, are the valued prizes of entomologists. Into that tunnelled
hole he inserts his long finger, and squash it goes into a large, pulpy,
fat, sweet grub. It takes but a moment to draw it out; and if it be a
pupa near the bark, so much the better for the aye-aye, so much the
worse for the beetle or cossus. I might dilate on this subject, but
prefer referring the reader to Professor Owen's memoir, and to his
lecture.[22] The aye-aye, in every point of its structure, like every
created thing, is full of design. Its curious fingers, especially the
skeleton-like chopstick of a digit referred to, attract especial notice,
from their evident adaptation to the condition of its situation and
existence, as one of the works of an omnipotent and beneficent Creator.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] The Durian, a peculiarly favourite fruit in several of the Eastern
Islands.
[7] Mr Wolf's drawing was taken from a chimpanzee. Mr Waterton's young
chimpanzee was in reality a small-eared gorilla. The ears of the
chimpanzee are large.
[8] Written in 1861. Skins and skeletons of the gorilla are to be found
now in many museums.
[9] For Jan. 1860, vol. iii., p. 177.
[10] Monkeys are very liable to lung diseases in this climate, and all
menagerie keepers are aware of the bad effects of the winter on these
denizens of a warm climate.
[11] See "Lives of the Lindsays," by Lord Lindsay, vol. iii., pp.
371-476.
[12] At Paradise. She describes some plants, one, evidently a Stapelia,
is a fine large star-plant, yellow and spotted like the skin of a
leopard, over which there grows a crop of glossy brown hair, at once
handsome and horrible; it crawls flat on the ground, and its leaves are
thick and fat (p. 407).
[13] "Conversations of Lord Byron" (p. 9).
[14] _Loc. cit._ (p. 1).
[15] "Works of Professor Wilson," vol. i., p. 73.
[16] Gilpin's "Forest Scenery," edited by Sir T. D. Lauder, vol. i., p.
354.
[17] "View of Society and Manners in Italy," vol. ii., p. 475.
[18] Extracted from the late Mr Cunningham's complete edition; we
neglected to quote the page, and have altered and shortened the words.
[19] "Memoirs of Rev. Sydney Smith," i., p. 377.
[20] "Wit and Wisdom of Rev. Sydney Smith" (it is from a lecture at the
Royal Institution), p. 259.
[21] "Life in the Mission, the Camp, and the Zenana; or, Six Years in
India," by Mrs Colin Mackenzie, vol. ii., p. 126.
[22] Published by James Nisbet & Co., in 1863, 1864.
BATS.