Various
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction / Volume 19, No. 535, February 25, 1832

ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS, REGENT'S PARK

THE POLAR BEAR.

THE TUNNEL.

MONKEY CAGE.

GARDENS OF THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY

REGENT'S PARK

A visit to these Gardens is one of the most delightful of the rational recreations of the metropolis. The walk out is pleasant enough: though there is little rural beauty on the road, the creations of art assume a more agreeable appearance than in the city itself; and, with cottages, park-like grounds, and flourishing wood, the eye may enjoy a few picturesque groupings.

The Garden of the Society is one of the prettiest in the vicinity of the metropolis; the Menagerie is certainly the most important ever collected in this country. It is a charming sight to behold myriads of tiny flowers fringing our very paths, and little groves of shrubs and young trees around us; yet it is a gratification of the highest order, to witness the animals of almost every country on the earth assembled within a few acres; and it is indeed a sublime study to observe how beautifully the links in the great chain of nature are wrought, and how admirably are the habits and structure of some of these animals adapted to the wants of man, while all are subservient to some great purpose in the scale of creation. How clearly are these truths taught by the science of Zoology; and how attractively are they illustrated in the Menagerie of the Zoological Gardens. Consider but for a moment that the cat which crouches by our fireside is of the same tribe with "the lordly lion," whose roar is terrific as an earthquake, and the tiger who often stays but to suck the blood of his victims: that the faithful dog, "who knows us personally, watches for us, and warns us of danger," is but a descendant from the wolf, who prowls through the wintry waste with almost untameable ferocity. Yet how do we arrive at the knowledge of these interesting facts—but by zoological study.

Two of the Cuts in the annexed page will furnish our country friends with the improved plan of keeping the animals in large open cages. The first represents that of the Polar Bear, of strong iron-work, with a dormitory adjoining. The enclosed area is flagged with stone, and in the centre is a tank, or pool, of water, in which the bear makes occasional plungings. The present occupant is but small in comparison with the usual size of the species. "Its favourite postures," observes Mr. Bennett, "are lying flat at its whole length; sitting upon its haunches with its fore legs perfectly upright, and its head in a dependent position; or standing upon all fours with its fore-paws widely extended and its head and neck swinging alternately from side to side, or upwards and downwards in one continued and equable libration."¹

The second Cut represents the tunnelled communication between the two Gardens, beneath the carriage-road of the Park. Above, the archway is a pediment, supported by two neat columns, and a terraced walk, with balustrades. The whole is handsomely executed in cement or imitative stone. The decorative vases are by Austin, of the New Road. A lion's head, in bold relief, forms an appropriate key-stone embellishment to the arch. The sloping banks are formed of mimic rock-work profusely intermingled with plants and flowers.

The third Cut is the Monkey House, of substantial iron-work, with dormitories and winter apartments in the rear. In fine sunny weather the monkeys may be here seen disporting their recreant limbs to the delight of crowds of visiters. Their species are too numerous but for a catalogue. Among them are the Negro and Sooty Monkeys,—the Mone Monkey: "the name of Monkey is supposed to be derived from the African appellation of this species, Mone corrupted into Monachus." Bonneted, pig-tailed, and Capuchin Monkeys; the last named from their dark crowns, like the capuch or hood of a Capuchin friar; and black and white-fronted Spider Monkeys, named from their great resemblance to large spiders.

By the way, there is an abundance of still life in the Gardens at this ungenial season. We find the Elephant, the Antelopes, and the Zebra, in their winter quarters, and their mightinesses, the large cats, as the lions, tiger, and leopards, accommodated with a snug fire. The tropical birds, as the parrots, maccaws, &c., have been removed from the extremity of the north garden to warmer quarters; and the hyaenas, leopards, and a host of smaller carnivorous quadrupeds have taken their places. The upper end is occupied by four roomy dens, with a lordly black-maned lion and a lioness, from Northern Africa; above them are a fine lioness and a leopard from Ceylon: these we take to have been among the recent arrivals from the Tower Menagerie.

FRAGMENTS ON HUMAN LIFE

(For the Mirror.)

"Call not earth a barren spot,
Pass it not ungrateful by,
'Tis to man a lovely lot."

There is no subject on which such a variety of opinions exist, as on the question "Whether man is happy;" and that it is not easy to be settled, is certain. Many persons have been so far contented with their lot as to wish to have their life over again, and yet as many have expressed themselves to the contrary.

Dr. Johnson, who always spoke of human life in the most desponding terms, and considered earth a vale of tears,

"Yet hope, not life from pain or sorrow free,
Or think the doom of man reversed for thee—"

declared that he would not live over again a single week of his life, had it been allowed him.² Such was his opinion on the past; but so great is the cheering influence with which Hope irradiates the mind, that in looking forward to the future, he always talked with pleasure on the prospect of a long life.

When he was in Scotland, Boswell told him that after his death, he intended to erect a memorial to him. Johnson, to whom the very mention of death was unpleasant, replied, "Sir, I hope to see your grand-children." On his death-bed he observed to the surgeon who was attending him, "I want life, you are afraid of giving me pain."

It has been supposed that this question had been settled by the authority of Scripture. "Man is born to trouble," says Job, "as the sparks fly upward." In turning over a few pages more, we find ourselves in doubt again. "The latter end of Job was more blessed than his beginning; for he had 14,000 sheep, and 6,000 camels, and 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 she-asses. He had also seven sons and three daughters. So Job died being old and full of days."

It may not be unpleasant to place before the reader the opinions of several celebrated men, on Life, that he may choose his side, and either like the bee or the spider, extract the poison or gather the honey. We will begin with Sterne, one who well knew the human heart.

"What is the life of man? is it not to shift from side to side! from sorrow to sorrow!"

"When I consider how oft we eat the bread of affliction, when one runs over the catalogue of all the cross reckonings and sorrowful items with which the heart of man is overcharged, 'tis wonderful by what hidden resources the mind is enabled to stand it out, and bear itself up, as it does, against the impositions laid upon our nature."—T. Shandy.

"A man has but a bad bargain of it at the best."—Chesterfield.

"No scene of human life but teems with mortal woe."—Sir Walter Scott.

In opposition to these sentiments, Franklin, in writing on the death of a friend, gives us his opinion, "It is a party of pleasure, some take their seats first."

And Lord Byron, describing Sunrise, in the second canto of Lara, says

"But mighty nature bounds as from her birth,
The sun is in the heavens, and life on earth;
Flowers in the valley, splendour in the beam.
Health on the gale, and freshness in the stream.
Immortal Man! Behold her glories shine,
And cry exultingly, 'They are thine'
Gaze on, while yet thy gladdened eyes may see,
A morrow comes when they are not for thee."

In the same spirit Cowper begins his poem on Hope:

"See Nature gay as when she first began,
With smiles alluring her admirer, man,
She spreads the morning over eastern hills.
Earth glitters with the drops the night distils.
The sun obedient at her call appears
To fling his glories o'er the robe she wears,
… to proclaim
His happiness, her dear, her only aim."

"The Thracians," says Cicero, "wept when a child was born, and feasted and made merry when a man went out of the world, and with reason. Show me the man who knows what life is, and dreads death, and I'll show thee a prisoner who dreads his liberty."

Of the misery of human life, Gray speaks in similar terms:

"To all their sufferings all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan,
The feeling for another's pain,
The unfeeling for his own."

Audi alteram partem:

"It's a happy world after all."—Paley.

And Gray himself:

"For who to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This careful, anxious being e'er resigned,
E'er left the precincts of the cheerful day
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind."

And another popular author:

"A world of pleasure is continually streaming in on every side. It only depends on man to be a demi-god, and to convert this world into Elysium."—Gaieties and Gravities.

It is doubtless wise to incline to the latter sentiment.

Of the instability of human happiness and glory, a fine picture is drawn by Appian, who represents Scipio weeping over the destruction of Carthage. "When he saw this famous city, which had flourished seven hundred years, and might have been compared to the greatest empires, on account of the extent of its dominions, both by sea and land, its mighty armies, its fleets, elephants and riches; and that the Carthaginians were even superior to other nations, by their courage and greatness of soul, as, notwithstanding their being deprived of arms and ships, they had sustained for three whole years, all the hardships and calamities of a long siege; seeing, I say, this city entirely ruined, historians relate that he could not refuse his tears to the unhappy fate of Carthage. He reflected that cities, nations, and empires are liable to revolutions, no less than particular men; that the like sad fate had befallen Troy, once so powerful; and in later times, the Assyrians, Medes, and Persians, whose dominions were once of so great an extent; and lastly, the Macedonians, whose empire had been so glorious throughout the world." Full of these mournful ideas, he repeated the following verse of Homer:

"The day shall come, that great avenging day,
Which Troy's proud glories in the dust shall lay,
When Priam's powers, and Priam's self shall fall,
And one prodigious ruin swallow all—"

thereby denouncing the future destiny of Rome, as he himself confessed to Polybius, who desired Scipio to explain himself on that occasion.

The Sketch-Book

A COASTING SCRAP

(For the Mirror.)

It was a bright summer afternoon: the estuary of Poole Harbour lay extended before me; its broad expanse studded with inlands of sand and furze bushes, of which Brownsea is the most considerable. A slight ripple marked the deeper channels which were of a blue colour, and the shallow mud banks being but barely covered by the tide, appeared like sheets of molten silver. The blue hills of Purbeck bounded the distant heath-lands to the westward, and the harbour extended itself inland towards the town of Wareham, becoming more and more intricate in its navigation, although it receives the contributions of two rivers, the Piddle and the Froome, arising probably from the soil carried down by the streams, and the faint action of the tide at a distance of eight or ten miles from the mouth of the harbour. The Wareham clay boats added life to the scene. Some were wending their way through the intricate channels close hauled upon a wind; others were going right away with a flowing sheet. On the eastern side was the bold sweep of the shore, extending to the mouth of the harbour, and terminating in a narrow point of bright sand hills, separating the quiet waters of the harbour from the boisterous turmoilings of the English Channel.

Sauntering along the Quay of Poole, indulging in a kind of reverie, thinking, or in fact, thinking of nothing at all, (a kind of waking dream, when hundreds of ideas, recollections, and feelings float with wonderful rapidity through the brain,) my attention was attracted by a stout, hardy-faced pilot, with water boots on his legs, and a red, woollen night-cap on his head, who was driving a very earnest bargain for a "small, but elegant assortment," of dabs and flounders. "Dree and zixpence if you like," said he. "I could a bought vour times as much vor one and zixpence coast-ways, if I'd a mind, and I'll give thee no more, and not a word of a lie." His oratory conquered the coyness of the fishy damsel; and he invited the lady to take a glass of "zomat avore he topped his boom for Swanwidge."

Having before me the certainty of a dull, monotonous afternoon, and cheerless evening, without any visible means of amusement, I instantly closed a bargain with Dick Hart (for such was the pilot's name) to give me a cast to Swanwidge. In a short time I found myself on board a trim, little pilot boat, gliding along the waters as the sun was sliding his downward course, and shedding a mellow radiance over the distant scenery towards Lytchett. The white steeple of Poole church was lighted by the rays, while the town presented a neat and picturesque appearance with the masts of the shipping cutting against the blue sky.

Dick Hart formed no small feature in the scene as he stood at the helm with his red cap and black, curly hair, smoking a short, clay pipe, which like his own face, had become rather brown in service. He looked around him with an air of independence and unconcern, as the "monarch of all he surveyed," casting his eye up now and then at the trim of his canvass, but more frequently keeping it on me. Dick began to open his budget of chat, and I found him as full of fun as his mainsail was full of nettles.

A voice from the forecastle called out to Dick, who was so intent on his story that the helm slipped from his hand, and the ship flew up in the wind, "Mind, skipper, or you will run down Old Betty." I was astonished at the insinuation against my noble captain that he was likely to behave rude to a lady, but my suspicions were soon removed, when I saw Old Betty was a buoy, floating on the waters, adorned with a furze bush. Old Betty danced merrily on the rippling wave with her furze bush by way of a feather, with shreds of dried sea weed hanging to it forming ribbons to complete the head dress of the lady buoy. The nearer we approached, the more rapid did Betty dance, and when we passed close alongside of her, she curtsied up and down as if to welcome our visit. Dick narrated why a buoy placed at the head of a mud bank obtained the name of a lady fair, and I briefly noted it down.

Many years ago a single lady resided at Poole, of plain manners, unaffected simplicity, affable, yet retiring, and—

"Passing rich with forty pounds a-year."

The gentry courted her, but she still adhered to her secluded habits. Year after year rolled on, and though some may have admired her, she was never led to the altar, and consequently her condition was unaltered. Kind and friendly neighbours kept a vigilant eye upon her proceedings, but her character was unimpeachable; and they all agreed that she was a very suspicious person, because they could not slander her. She lived a blameless single lady.

Her attentions were directed to an orphan boy. He was her constant companion, and the object of her tenderest solicitude. As he grew up he excelled the youth of his own age in manly exercises; could thrash all of his own size, when insulted, but never played the tyrant, or the bully. He could make the longest innings at cricket, and as for swimming in all its various branches, none could compare with William. It was finally arranged by a merchant to send William a voyage to Newfoundland, and the news soon spread round the town that William (for he was a general favourite) was to see the world by taking to the sea.

The time arrived when the ship was to be warped out from the Quay, and to sail for her destination. The crew and the passengers were all on board, and William was, by his absence, rather trespassing on the indulgence of the captain; but who could be angry with the boy whom every body loved?

The town gossips, and many a fair maiden, were on the Quay to see young William embark. The tide had already turned, and the captain was about to give the word "to cast off and let all go;" to send the vessel, as it were, adrift, loose and unfettered upon the waters, to struggle as a thing of life with the billows of the Atlantic, but animated and controled by the energies of men. Just at this moment William appeared at the end of the Quay, walking slowly to the scene of embarkation with his kind and benevolent benefactress leaning, and leaning heavily, for her heart was heavy, upon the arm of her dutiful and beloved William. As they approached, the crowd made way with profound respect, not the cringing respect paid to superior wealth, but with that respect which worth of character and innate virtue can and will command, though poverty may smite and desolate.

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1

The Gardens and Menagerie of the Zoological Society delineated. Vol. I.

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2

Chamfort observes, that the writers on physics, natural history, physiology, and chemistry, have been generally men of a mild, even, and happy temperament, while the writers on politics, legislation, and even morals, commonly exhibited a melancholy and fretful spirit. It is to be expected that an inspection of the beauty and order of nature should affect the mind with peculiar pleasure.—Gaieties and Gravities.

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