The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, by Various
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THE MIRROR OF LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.
VOL. 20, No. 560] SATURDAY, AUGUST 4, 1832. [PRICE 2_d_.
* * * * *
THE ELEPHANTS IN THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS, REGENT'S PARK.
[Illustration: THE ELEPHANT, IN THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS, REGENT'S PARK.]
The annexed Engraving will probably afford the reader a better idea of
the Zoological Gardens, than did either of our previous Illustrations.
It is indeed a fair specimen of the luxurious accommodation afforded by
the Society for their animals; while it enables us to watch the habits
of the stupendous tenants in a state of nature, or at least, free from
unnecessary restriction or confinement. It is an opportunity hitherto
but rarely enjoyed in this country; the Elephants exhibited in our
menageries being caged up, and only allowed to protrude the head outside
the bars. The Duke of Devonshire, as our readers may recollect,
possessed an Elephant which died in the year 1829: she was allowed the
range of a spacious paddock at Chiswick, but her docility, intelligence,
and affection, which were extraordinary, were only witnessed by a few
visiters. In the _Jardin du Roi_, at Paris, the Elephant has long
enjoyed advantages proportionate to his importance in the scale of
creation. Six years since we remember seeing a fine young specimen in
the enjoyment of an ample enclosure of greensward, and a spacious bath
has since been added to the accommodations. This example has been
rightly followed in our Zoologicai Gardens.
The Elephant Stable is at the extremity of the northern garden in the
Regent's Park. It is of capacious dimensions, but is built in a style of
unappropriate rusticity. Adjoining the stable is a small enclosure,
which the Elephant may measure in two or three turns. Opposite is an
enclosure of much greater extent, so as to be almost worthy of the name
of a little park or paddock. The fence is of iron, and light but
substantial. Within the area are a few lime-trees, the lower branches of
which are thinned by the Elephant repeatedly twisting off their foliage
with his trunk, as adroitly as a gardener would gather fruit. His main
luxury is, however, in his bath, which is a large pool or tank of water,
of depth nearly equal to his height. In hot weather he enjoys his
ablutions here with great gusto, exhibiting the liveliest tokens of
satisfaction and delight. Our artist has endeavoured to represent the
noble creature in his bath, though the pencil can afford but an
imperfect idea of the extasy of the animal on this occasion. His
evolutions are extraordinary for a creature of such stupendous size. His
keeper had at first some difficulty in inducing him to enter the pond,
but he now willingly takes to the water, and thereby exhibits himself in
a point of view in which we have not hitherto been accustomed to view an
Elephant in this country. The fondness of Elephants for bathing is very
remarkable. When in the water they often produce a singular noise with
their trunks. Bishop Heber describes this habit as he witnessed it near
Dacca:--"A sound struck my ear, as if from the water itself on which we
were riding, the most solemn and singular I can conceive. It was long,
loud, deep, and tremulous, somewhat between the bellowing of a bull and
the blowing of a whale, or perhaps most like those roaring buoys which
are placed at the mouths of some English harbours, in which the winds
make a noise to warn ships off them. 'Oh,' said Abdallah, 'there are
Elephants bathing: Dacca much place for Elephant.' I looked immediately,
and saw about twenty of these fine animals, with their heads and trunks
just appearing above the water. Their bellowing it was which I had
heard, and which the water conveyed to us with a finer effect than if we
had been on shore." The Elephant can also eject from his trunk water and
dust, and his own saliva, over every part of his body, to cool its
heated surface; and he is said to grub up dust, and blow it over his
back and sides, to keep off the flies.
There are two Elephants in the Zoological Gardens. Both are of the
Asiatic species. The larger animal was purchased by the Society about
fifteen months since. It is probably about eleven years old, and is
still growing; and a register of its bulk at various periods has been
commenced. The smaller Elephant was presented to the Society by Sir
Edward Barnes, late governor of Ceylon. It has been stated to be a dwarf
variety, and that its age is not far short of that of the larger
individual; but this assertion is questionable. It is much more
consistent with our knowledge of the species to regard it, in the
absence of all previous knowledge of the history of the individual, as a
young one not exceeding four years old. This specimen will be seen in
the distance of the Engraving.[1]
[1] The new-born Elephant is about three feet long. Between
fifteen and twenty years of age, Elephants may be said to be
adult. In India it is thought that they live three centuries.
The natural history of the Elephant would occupy many pages. A few
points, however, are peculiarly interesting in connexion with the
individuals from India, in the Zoological Gardens. The Indian Elephant
appears, when fully grown, to attain a larger size than the African, the
females commonly measuring from seven to eight, and the males from eight
to ten, feet in height; though we find in old accounts the height of the
Asiatic Elephant stated at fifteen or sixteen feet. The head of the
Indian is more oblong than that of the African Elephant; and the
forehead of the former has a deep concavity, while the head of the
African is round and convex in all its parts. The teeth of the Indian
species consist of narrow transverse bands of equal size, while those of
the African are larger in the middle than at the ends, and are lozenge
shaped. The ears of the Asiatic are smaller, and descend only to his
neck, while in the African species the ears cover the shoulders. The
former has four distinct toes, and the latter but three, on his hind
feet. The Elephants of Ceylon are much prized for size, beauty, and
hardihood. If the small Elephant in the Gardens be a native of Ceylon,
it is by no means a beautiful specimen of the variety.
* * * * *
STANZAS ON REVISITING LUDLOW CASTLE.
Pale ruin! once more as I gaze on thy walls,
What memories of old, the sad vision recalls,
For change o'er thee lightly has past;
Yet what hearts are estrang'd and what bright hopes are fled,
And friends I erst dwelt with now sleep with the dead,
Since in childhood I gazed on thee last!
Thine image still rests on the clear stream beneath,
And flow'rs as of yore, thy old battlement wreathe,
Like rare friends by adversity's side;
Still clinging aloft, the wild tree I behold
That marks in derision, the spot, where of old
The standard once floated in pride.
But the conqueror, Time, hath thy banner o'erthrown,
And crumbled to ruin the courtyards that shone
With chivalry's gorgeous array;
And where music, and laughter so often have rung,
In thy tapestried halls, now the ivy hath flung
A mantle to hide their decay.
Through the hush of thy lone haunts I wander again,
Where these time-hallow'd relics, familiar remain,
As if charmed into magic repose;
The pass subterraneous,--the fathomless well,
The mound whence the violet peeps--and the cell
Where the fox-glove in solitude grows.
In the last rays of sunset thy grey turrets gleam,
Yet I linger with thee--as to muse o'er a dream,
That mournful truths soon will dispel;
My pathway winds onward--life's cares to renew,
And I feel, as thy towers now fade from my view,
'Tis for over--I bid thee farewell!
E.L.J.
* * * * *
THE NOVELIST.
* * * * *
THE HUNTSMAN.
_A Traditionary Tale: by Miss M.L. Beevor._
"The merciful man is merciful to his beast."
"The worm we tread upon will turn again."
Charles, the chief huntsman of Baron Mortimer, was undeniably a very
handsome young man, the _beau ideal_ of the lover, as pictured by the
glowing imagination of maidens, and the beau _real_ of a dozen villages
in the vicinity of Mortimer Castle. Yet, was his beauty not amiable, but
rather calculated to inspire terror and distrust, than affection and
confidence: in fact, a bandit may be uncommonly handsome; but, by the
fierce, haughty character of his countenance, the fire which flashes
from his eyes, and the contempt which curls his mustachoed lip, create
fear, instead of winning regard, and this was the case with Charles.
One, however, of those maidens, unto whom it was the folly and vanity of
his youth to pay general court, conceived for him a passion deep and
pure, which in semblance, at least, he returned; but how far to answer
his own nefarious purposes, for Charles Elliott was a godless young man,
we shall hereafter discover.
Annette Martin was the daughter of a small farmer who resided about a
mile and a half from the Castle; but, being the tenant of Lord Mortimer,
had not only frequent occasion to go thither himself with the rural
produce of his farm, (for which the Castle was a ready market,) but also
to send Annette. Thus then commenced that innocent girl's acquaintance
with the Baron's chief huntsman, not long after Elliott's induction into
that office, by the resignation of his superannuated predecessor.
Strange rumours were afloat respecting the conduct of Charles; none of
which, it is to be presumed, met the Baron's ears, or assuredly the
deprivation of his office would have followed. But Lord Mortimer was a
young man, paying his addresses to a lady who lived at some distance
from the Castle, and consequently much absent from it. And, what said
pretty Annette to the rumours which failed not to meet _her_ ear, of her
lover's misconduct? "I don't believe a word of them! Charles may be
fonder of pleasure than of business, but he is a young man; by and by he
will see and feel the necessity of steady application to the duties of
his situation, and become less wild and more manly." "NEVER!" would be
solemnly enunciated by Annette's auditors. "As to the charge," would she
undauntedly continue, "brought against him of cruelty to the dogs under
his care, it is an abominable falsehood; Elliott may be passionate, I
don't say he is not, but he is generous and humane. _I_ have never seen
him scourge the hounds, as you tell me he does, until blood drops from
their mangled hides; _I_ have never heard the cries which, you say,
resound from their kennels day and night; cries of pain and hunger."
"And have you never seen," would ask some well-meaning tale-bearer, "any
of those poor brutes, whose wealed and mangled coats, proclaimed how
savagely they had been treated?"
"I have indeed seen," would answer Annette, "dogs lacerated by the wild
boars with which the Castle forests abound."
"And have you never observed the miserable skin-and-bone plight of my
lord's hounds?"
"They are not thinner, Charles says, than most hounds in good training:
when dogs get fat, they become lazy, lose the faculty of finding game,
and the inclination of bringing it down."
"Dogs it is true, ought not to be pampered and surfeited, but they ought
to be _fed_." Upon this, Annette would vehemently maintain that fed they
were, and amply, as she had seen Elliott cut up their meat; whilst the
friendly newsmonger would charitably hint, that her intended knew as
well as most men how to turn an _honest_ penny, by cheating the dogs of
their food, and selling it elsewhere.
Annette cared little for inuendos which she attributed chiefly to malice
and ill-nature. None are so difficult to convince as those who are
obstinately deaf to conviction, and there is an idolatry of affection
which sometimes burns fonder and deeper, as its object is contemned and
despised by the world. Annette had also some idea, that these, and other
reports to the prejudice of Charles, originated with an unsuccessful
rival, though poor William Curry, amiable, single-minded, and
good-humoured as he was, never breathed in her presence, a syllable to
the disparagement of Elliott.
Time sped, and upon an occasion when Lord Mortimer returned for a week
or two to his Castle, the conduct of his chief huntsman was reported to
him; but Charles with consummate art, so vindicated himself, and so
contrived to disgrace his accusers, that when the young baron again left
home, he stood higher perhaps than ever, in his confidence and favour.
It was the bright summer-time, the period when rural folks make holiday,
(at least they did so then, but times have strangely altered of late in
once _merry_ England,) the woods put on their brightest green, and the
people their finest clothes, for there were wakes, fairs, and rustic
meetings innumerable in the vicinity of the Castle. Charles the huntsman
might, as usual, be seen at these _fetes_ for nothing, but after his
late victory, he carried his head higher, assumed a swaggering gait, and
looked his neighbours out of countenance with impudent defiance.
The village feasts were not yet over, when late one night, a cavalier,
passing through one of the great forests which surrounded Mortimer
Castle, beheld, (for it was a moon-light night,) a female form slowly
sauntering about the bridle-way in which he was riding, and uttering
heavy moans and sobs. At first, taking this figure for something
supernatural, the traveller was startled, but quickly recovering
himself, he rode boldly up to, and addressed, the object of his idle
fears:--"I have been waiting here for hours," replied the young woman,
for such indeed she was, "and my friend is not yet come; I am sadly
afraid, sir, some accident may have happened to him."
"_Him!_" quoth the stranger laughing, "O my good girl, if you be waiting
for a _gentleman_, no wonder you're disappointed. He has played you
false, rely upon it, and won't come to night,--so you'd better go home."
"O sir! O my Lord!--I cannot--I dare not! What would father and mother
say? and what could I say?"
"Ay--Annette,--Annette Martin,--what _could_ you say?"
"Only the _truth_, your lordship;" replied the poor girl sobbing, and
curtseying, "and then they'd turn me out of doors, for they do so hate
Charles,--Charles Elliott, your honour,--that they've as good as sworn,
as they'll never consent to my marrying him, and so--and so--I was just
a waiting here to-night for him to come as he promised he would, and
take me away to the far off town, and"--
"And there marry you, I suppose, without your father and mother's
consent:--eh, Annette?"
"Yes, my lord, an please you," replied the poor girl with another rustic
dip.
"No, Annette," replied the young baron, "it does not quite please me;
and Charles, at any rate, unless some very unforeseen circumstance
should have detained him, shall know what _I_ think of his present
conduct to you. But come,--mount behind me,--I am unexpectedly returning
to the Castle, Dame Trueby shall there make you comfortable for
to-night, your parents and friends shall never know but that your
absence from home was occasioned by a regular visit to her, and your
marriage in two or three days, with _my_ sanction, Annette, will, I
think, completely settle matters."
The urbane young baron alighting, assisted Annette to mount his noble
steed, who, though overwhelmed by his kindness, refused to listen to all
the consolation, or banterings, with which he endeavoured to cheer her
on her way to Castle Mortimer, choosing rather to believe that some
dreadful accident had befallen her lover, than that carelessness, or
perfidy, caused his absence. Dame Trueby's account was little calculated
to soothe Annette's anxiety, or to satisfy Lord Mortimer respecting
Elliott's proceedings.
"I have not seen Charles," said she, "since early this morning, when I
heard him say he was going to feed the hounds, poor creatures! and time
enough that he did, I think, considering that he left them without a
morsel for a whole day and night, whilst he was capering away at
Woodcroft Feast; and then,--the beast!--what does he, but comes back so
dead drunk that we were forced to carry him up to bed; meanwhile, the
hungry brutes, poor dumb souls, just ready to eat one another, have been
fit to raise the very dead with their barking, and ramping, and
yowling!"
"A sad account is this, Margery."
"A very _true_ one, please your lordship," replied the old housekeeper,
testily.
"I don't doubt it," returned Lord Mortimer, "but cannot at this time of
night, dame, with Charles absent, and this young woman, his intended
wife, wanting some refreshment and a bed (for which indeed I have ample
need myself), make any inquiry into the affair. Let Elliott call me in
the morning instead of More, do you meanwhile make this young woman as
comfortable as you can, and _recollect_, Mrs. Trueby, _that she is come
to the Castle upon a visit to you_."
Margery curtseyed, and "yessed," and "very welled," with apparent
submission, but though she dared not express her thoughts, it was easy
to read in her ample countenance, sad suspicions relative to the honour
of her noble master, and of the forlorn damsel thus thrust upon her
peculiar hospitality. "And," continued Lord Mortimer, "Charles, you are
sure, fed the dogs this morning?"
"Don't know, my lord, I'm sure," replied the old housekeeper, doggedly,
"I suppose he did, and belike beat 'em too; I only know they've been
quiet all day, which, it stands to reason, they wouldn't have been
without _wittals_; but Master Elliott, I've not seen since."
"Not since early this morning, and 'tis now midnight! Where can he be?"
"The Lord knows, sir! after no good I doubt, for he's a wild lad, and
these fairs and dances, fairly turn his brain."
Little further passed that night between the young lord and his
housekeeper; after taking some refreshment he retired to rest, and poor
Annette also sought, under the auspices of circumspect Mistress Margery,
repose in Castle Mortimer, little anticipating the singularly dreadful
disclosure of the ensuing morning. Charles, in fact, not having
returned, one of the inferior serving-men,--who durst not, now that his
master was at home, stand upon the punctilio of "_not my business_,"
undertook soon after dawn to "see to the hounds," in his stead; when
upon opening the door of the large enclosure in which they were kept, he
there beheld, to his unutterable consternation and horror, _the mangled
remnants of the careless and cruel Huntsman_: these consisted of his
clothes, torn into strips, and dyed in blood, with fragments sufficient
of flesh and bone to attest the hideous fact, that the ravenous brutes,
had, after their last long fast, sprung upon their tormentor, (awful
retribution!) even at the very moment when he appeared amongst them with
their long delayed meal, torn him in pieces, and devoured him!
Lord Mortimer, though, he could not in conscience blame his canine
favourites, nor forbear regarding his huntsman's fate as a signal
instance of the retributive justice of Providence, felt himself obliged
to destroy the whole pack, after their ferocious banquet on human flesh;
and with tears in his eyes, he forced himself to witness their
execution, lest the cupidity or misjudging kindness of any of his
retainers, should induce them to mitigate the culprits' doom. The horrid
story spread far and wide, and one of its earliest results was the
appearance at Castle Mortimer of a poor woman and three young children,
who stated in an agony of grief, that _she_ was the lawful _wife_ of the
deceased Charles Elliott, whom he had maintained in a distant town, unto
whom his visits, when off duty at the Castle, and absent without leave,
were sometimes paid, and who, with her children, being suddenly bereaved
by his awful demise of their sole hope and support, now humbly threw
themselves upon the benevolence of Lord Mortimer for employment and
subsistence!
The grief and confusion of poor Annette Martin, upon this discovery of
black villany meditated against her by the unprincipled huntsman, and
upon its miraculous and awful frustration, may be imagined: yet had it
also its beneficial influence; for, whilst shuddering at the fearful end
of the wretch who had plotted her destruction, her once fond affection
was converted into bitter hatred; and, ere long, blessing and thanking
God for her miraculous preservation, and casting the very memory of the
deceiver from her heart, she was without much difficulty persuaded to
become the wife of William Curry, her once rejected, but really worthy
and amiable admirer.
* * * * *
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.
* * * * *
PORTUGAL.
(_Abridged chiefly from the Rev. Mr. Kinsey's "Portugal Illustrated."_)
_Spaniards and Portuguese._--"Strip a Spaniard of all his virtues, and
you make a good Portuguese of him," says the Spanish proverb. I have
heard it said more truly, "Add hypocrisy to a Spaniard's vices, and you
have the Portuguese character." These nations blaspheme God by calling
each other natural enemies. Their feelings are mutually hostile; but the
Spaniards despise the Portuguese, and the Portuguese hate the
Spaniards.--_Southey._
_Portugal._--Situated by the side of a country just five times its size,
Portugal, but for the advantageous position of its coast, the good faith
of England, and the weakness of its hostile neighbour, impassable roads,
and numerous strong places, would long since have returned to the
primitive condition of an Iberian province; but its separate existence
as a nation has been preserved to it by the strength of the British
alliance being brought into a glorious co-operation with all its own
internal means of defence.--_Kinsey._
_Column of Disgrace._--About the middle of the last century, the Duke of
Aviero was detected in a conspiracy with the Jesuits in Portugal, and
accordingly executed. His house, at Belem, was levelled to the ground at
the time of the Duke's decapitation, and on the site was erected _a
column of disgrace_, which still remains, though some shops have been
erected beside it to hide the inscription; a just symbol of the conduct
of the nation on this subject, for what they cannot alter they strive to
conceal.
Over the proscenium of the opera-house at Lisbon is a large clock placed
rather in advance, whose dexter supporter is old Time with his scythe,
and the sinister, one of the Muses playing on a lyre.
_A Lisbon Dandy._--A small, squat, puffy figure incased within a large
pack-saddle, upon the back of a lean, high-boned, straw-fed,
cream-coloured nag, with an enormously flowing tail, whose length and
breadth would appear to be each night guarded from discolouration by
careful involution above the hocks. Taken, from his gridiron spurs and
long pointed boots, up his broad, blue-striped pantaloons, _a la
Cossaque_, to the thrice-folded piece of white linen on which he is
seated in _cool_ repose; thence by his cable chain, bearing seals as
large as a warming-pan, and a key like an anchor; then a little higher
to the figured waistcoat of early British manufacture, and the
sack-shapened coat, up to the narrow brim sugar-loaf hat on his
head,--where can be found his equal? Nor does he want a nose as big as
the gnomon of a dial-plate; and two flanks of impenetrable, deep, black
brushwood, extending under either ear, and almost concealing the
countenance, to complete the singular contour of his features.
_A Lisbon Water-carrier_ earns about sixpence per day, the moiety of
which serves to procure him his bread, his fried sardinha from a cook's
stall, and a little light wine perhaps, on holidays,--water being his
general beverage, nay, one might almost say, his element. A mat in a
large upper room, shared with several others, serves him in winter as a
place of repose for the night; but during the summer he frequently
sleeps out in the open air, making his filled water-barrel his pillow.
_Vanity._--A young Lisbon dandy hearing an Englishman complain of the
intolerable filth and stench of his metropolis, retorted that, for his
part, when he was in London, it was the absence of that filth, and the
want of the smells complained of, that had rendered his residence in our
metropolis so disagreeable and uncomfortable to him. "No passion," as
Southey says, "makes a man a liar so easily as vanity."
_Dogs._--In Lisbon dogs seem to luxuriate under the violence of the
heat, and to avoid the shady sides of the streets, though the
thermometer of Fahrenheit be at 110 degrees; and scarcely an instance of
canine madness is ever known to occur. When the French decreed the
extinction of the tribe of curs that infest the streets, no native
executioner could be found to put the exterminating law in force; nay,
the very measure excited popular indignation.