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birth and early associations, I cannot avoid recollecting that such things were; and a sigh will sometimes escape me when I reflect that the remainder of my days must be spent among beings so artificial as the human race. I am disgusted with their vain boastings. To hear them talk, one would really imagine that they were all perfection; and yet they are indebted to the beasts of the field and the birds of the air, and even to poor miserable worms, for their outward skins, their own being of such a wretched texture as to be nearly useless; and, strange as it may seem to animals who have been clad by nature, these borrowed coverings are a chief source of pride to the creatures called men and women. The greater part of their lives is spent in putting them off and on, and endeavoring to procure a greater variety, in which to strut about and endeavor to imitate the monkey tribe. But their imitations are perfectly ridiculous, and never can approach the graceful and natural agility of our tribes, which they, notwithstanding, affect to consider as beneath them!

It would be an endless task to recount all the follies of their various attempts at concealing their natural deformity. The males, having no tail of their own, decorate themselves with one made from the wool of sheep; and so ignorant are they of the real and native elegance of this appendage, that they split it in two pieces, which hangs uselessly dangling behind them! The variety of these mock upper skins worn by the females is yet infinitely greater; a circumstance the more remarkable, because that sex have far less occasion for concealing their persons. Indeed, I have seen some of them who need not fear a comparison with the comeliest of our own tribes. They have far more natural vivacity than the males, are much more kind and amiable in disposition, and, particularly when young, evince a partiality for the monkey race in general, which has frequently been a

source of amusement to me. Their sham skins are usually of various colors, but generally so arranged as to indicate that they wish to look like birds, while their mates endeavor, as much as possible, to appear like us.

It was my misfortune, in early life, to fall into the hands of this species of animals, of whose existence no one, in the extensive districts belonging to our tribes, was previously aware and it has been my lot, with some few brief intervals, to remain among them ever since. I am now grown old and grey in captivity; but I shall not indulge in the natural garrulity of old age to such an extent as to write all the events of my eventful life, notwithstanding that hope sometimes whispers flatteringly in mine ear, that many monkeys will peruse these reminiscences with interest and gratification, if not with advantage.

It is acknowledged by all, that the earth has undergone strange and divers revolutions, not only as it regards its organic formation, and the changes constantly in progress by the agency of rivers, floods, seas, and subterranean fires, but in the power held by different animals over extensive tracts upon its surface. Long before man was known, our tribes possessed a wide and undisputed sway over regions now disfigured in a strange manner by what are called houses, little dirty hillocks with holes in them, from whence smoke issues, as if in petty imitation of a volcano. Men dwell in these, and have so increased in number for the last few centuries, that it really becomes a serious question how their encroachments are to be put a stop to, so as to preserve upon the face of the earth a sufficient space for the aboriginal inhabitants. Sometimes a feeling of despair comes over me when think on the present state of things, and I am haunted with the idea,

almost amounting to conviction, that I am doomed to be the last monkey. But it may not be so! The reign of man, like that of the lions, tigers, and elephants, must have an end and then our tribes may again be in the ascendant. Why they should not now be so I cannot conceive, unless it be from a want of union among ourselves; for such is the cowardice of the human race, that even I, old and decrepid as I am, have put half a dozen to flight by merely showing my teeth, and could clear the whole house where I am now writing in five minutes, were it not that I find their services convenient in this strange country, where there are few trees, and scarcely any fruit worth gathering. So I employ them to bring me food from better climates, and, upon the whole, have little reason to complain of their neglect. But it was not always thus. I have undergone many hardships, particularly after my first arrival in this country, which they call Great Britain, although it is but a small island, and a mere speck when compared with other nations. But the inhabitants possess a great deal of influence among their kind, owing, it is said, principally to certain of them called sailors. And I am inclined to believe the fact, partly because I have had opportunities of witnessing the bravery of that class of men, and received many attentions from them during my voyage here; but, principally, because the generality of them have a real tail, (which, however, grows out of their head!) and are very expert in the noble science of climbing.

I am aware that many things which I may state will probably startle monkeys of a future age; but I consider myself as performing a duty for the benefit of future generations. Future generations did I say? What and if there should be no more! Again that dreadful apprehension comes over me! Cold

and chill, and shudderingly, it creeps throughout my whole system—it shakes me to the centre-and again my blood returns throbbing, boiling, and rushing through my veins, my brain feels scorched, and in vain I seek to quench in tears those torments which inwardly consume me, as I think on my bitter doom of desolation. And am I indeed to be the last monkey? No; I will not admit the idea, notwithstanding the fruitless research which I have prosecuted for years to discover one of our race, which must still exist in liberty and independence, basking in the rays of the genuine monkey sun, (for here they have one which scarcely emits an warmth,) or gamboling in the delicious shade of fruit-bearing forests. But the picture is too painful for me to follow up. It recalls me to the charms of my dearest Keeba, my first love, and the graceful activity of Monicha, my second, and the amiable playfulness of Simiana, my third, and the delicately refined taste of Cercopitheca, my fourth, whose heart I won one morning by a present of two moths, and a beetle of unusual dimensions; and my fifthalas! here memory fails me-I cannot exactly recollect who was my fifth-But it is no matter; for perhaps, after all, it scarcely becomes the gravity of age and grey hairs to dilate on such subjects.

Let me be serious, and write of more important concerns and events, so that my manuscript may prove a treasure of instruction and amusement to the fortunate monkey into whose hands it may fall, and my name and memory be cherished in after ages. First, then, of my name. I am known in this climate by that of Jocko, an appellation given to me by the human race, who thereby evinced their deplorable ignorance, since every well-informed monkey knows that Pongo* and Jocko are the names of animals very different from us, and, as I have ascertained

* The greater and smaller species of Ourang-outang.

by comparison, bearing a much greater affinity to man, and consequently, every way inferior to us in the scale of nature. Indeed the only striking similarity between man and our tribes appears to be the reciprocal taste for imitating each other; a foolish propensity, to which, in my younger days, I was much addicted, and which, to confess my folly, was the cause of my captivity. It happened in this wise. We were sitting, a whole troop of us, in calm and rational chat, under the shelter of a noble banyan-tree, which threw its hundred stems and thousand roots into the earth, and its million branches, curving in beauty, into the upper air. There were the splendid and gaudy-colored birds, pluming themselves in tranquillity, and there were we, sitting in picturesque groups, amid the verdant foliage, with our wives, our sweethearts, and our little ones; sometimes cracking a joke, and sometimes cracking a nut, or regaling upon the various dainties with which our pouches were stored. Suddenly an alarm was given by our sentinels of the approach of strangers. We

were instantly upon the alert, and, to our astonishment, perceived about half a score animals of different and extraordinary colors advancing upon their hind legs, some with split tails, and some with the little single tail growing out of their head, as before described. Their heads were almost all different in form; one was small and flat, another large and round, like a huge gourd; a third, long and high, with a tuft of feathers at the top; and a fourth, with the sides squeezed together, and curved like a cresset moon reversed. All, however, were unnatural, and we gazed upon them, for some time, with various feelings, according to our different temperaments. For my own part, I must say that I did not share in the alarm visible in many countenances around me; a strong feeling of curiosity swallowed up every other emotion, and I kept my eye intently fixed upon the intruders,

who, for some time, appeared to be totally unconscious of our vicinity.

At length some of our females, in spite of strict orders to the contrary, found it impossible to keep their tongues quiet any longer, and began a-jabbering, which drew the attention of the strange creatures upon us. It was now useless to hesitate, so we all immediately joined in the cry of our tribe, and warned the intruders not to approach nearer, upon their peril, or they must abide the consequences.

The animals, however, persisted, in spite of all our vociferations, to which they only replied by a strange sort of cackling, which I have since found is called laughing, and, discordant as it is, is held by them in high estimation, as a peculiar privilege and perfection of their species. When they had come under the shade of our banyan, we gave them notice to quit, in a manner which it was impossible to misunderstand, namely, we pelted them with sticks and stones, which we had previously collected, and other convenient missiles. For some time, notwithstanding, they kept their ground, and continued the cackling as before, varied occasionally by a sharp noise made by clapping their forepaws together. One among them attempted to climb into the tree; but his clumsiness was perfectly ridiculous, and amused us exceedingly. much indeed was I delighted, that I jumped and squeaked, and nearly fell off the branch on which I sat. Never, that I recollect, was I in higher spirits. I considered the animals below us, in every respect beneath me; and in mere wantonness, took deliberate aim at the one with a half-moon head, whom I hit with part of a cocoa nutshell in the cheek, whereat he appeared to be much exasperated, and immediately seized what I then fancied was a stick, from one of his companions, and pointed it towards me. The manner in which he did this was, as Ithought, exceedingly preposterous; for he held it as if to make me be

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lieve it formed part of his own nose. I was much astonished, however, when a great noise, as of thunder, issued out of the end, with a cloud of dust, and my wife, who was close by my side, began to scream, and tumbled out of the tree. I attributed the fall to her own clumsiness, as she was an awkward monkey; and, to say the truth, we had not lived happily together for some time, for she was considerably larger than myself, and had given me a severe beating only the day before. When I saw her lying on the ground, and perfectly quiet, I knew she must be dead, being satisfied that nothing less would have quieted her; and I felt my mind greatly relieved, and began to look round among our troop for another mate.

In the meanwhile, the new-comers below began pulling my dead old wife about in a strange manner, turning her round and round, and jabbering to each other. At first I fancied they were going to eat her; but, at length, they laid her down, and I was glad to perceive that they had not had the sense to take the fruit which was in her pouch, and which I resolved to make my own immediately on their departure.

The strange creatures now clustered together, and began to eat and drink, after an extraordinary fashion, out of the shells of cocoa nuts and large gourds. Their mode of drinking out of the latter particularly interested us; and, when they went away, we were somewhat surprised to observe that they left several behind them standing on the ground.

Perhaps my spirits were somewhat elevated in consequence of my wife's fall. Be that as it may, I was one of the first to descend and examine the hollow gourds left by the strangers; and I was accompanied by several young females of our tribe, who had witnessed Glumdalla's accident, and therefore knew that I was at libery to attend them. The things were half filled with

what seemed to be water; so, following our imitative propensities, we either lifted them in our forepaws, or dipped in our heads, and began to drink, as the strange animals had done. In a very short space of time, I felt myself unusually vigorous and active: it seemed to me as though I was larger and stronger than any of our troop; and my courage was such, that I almost wished my old wife alive again, that I might return the drubbings she had given me. My companions likewise appeared to have undergone a change. The females seemed handsomer, and the males uglier than usual; but all were merry and clamorous: and, indeed, it appeared as though we were trying which should make the most noise, and most frequently get possession of the gourds to imitate the strangers.

I have a very confused recollection of the manner in which that eventful scene terminated. There was some quarreling, I remember, among us, and we fought; but I have no idea what it was about. The last thing that I can call to mind appears like a dream; and I should ever have believed it nothing more, but for the deplorable consequences, by which the whole tenor of my life has been changed. It seemed as though the strange and great animals suddenly came upon us; but their manner was altogether different from that which they had practised on their first visit. Instead of moving slowly as before, they now flew about, like birds, in every direction; and I was astonished to see them overtake and lay hold of several of the most active among us. At length one approached me, and stretched out his long forepaw. Resistance against such a monster was not to be thought of. I therefore ran towards a stem of the banyan, which I unaccountably missed; but in a very short time I laid hold of another, which I thought to climb with the speed of lightning; when, to my great amazement, the whole tree had suddenly grown to such a

height that its branches were above the clouds, which I plainly perceived rolling between me and them. Overcome by the dread of my pursuer, and this appalling change in the face of nature, my limbs refused to perform their office-I fell, exhausted, to the ground, and all remains a blank on the tablet of memory, from that moment till I awoke, ill and feverish, and surrounded by the human species.

It seems that the liquid which they had left in the calibashes (as they call them) was of an intoxicating nature, and had deprived us of the use of our faculties. I had got drunk. What " drunk" means, together with many other terms and things unknown to us, shall be explained in a glossary, which I shall annex to this manuscript, for the benefit of all inquisitive monkeys.

The cruelty of thus depriving us of our senses, for the sake of afterwards taking us prisoners, must appear to the reader as most execrable. But, to do justice to the human race, they do not consider the former any punishment; on the contrary, it is an infliction which they constantly practise on their dearest friends, and nothing seems to afford them greater pleasure. They meet together frequently in large bodies, for this very purpose; and at the commencement of their proceedings, I have sometimes been quite startled at their close

very

resemblance to us, as they sit and grin and nod at each other; but, after a while, they become awkward and stupid, and are not fit to be compared with the meanest of our tribes. The only motive that I guess for this strange practice is, that they thereby get rid, for a time, of a very troublesome thing which they call reason,' "about which they are eternally chattering, and pretending that it is something superior to our instinct.

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What the precise nature of this boasted "reason is, I have never been able satisfactorily to decide. It is, however, somewhat remarkable, that whenever a man has lost what little falls to his share, in one of these drinking bouts, he always imagines that he is possessed of much more than any one else, and believes himself the only animal fit to rule over his tribe. One can hardly conceive anything more ridiculous. If they had any quality at all comparable with instinct, it would be impossible for them to fall twice into such a stupid error; for they really make themselves quite ill by this foolish custom; and I have heard that some even hasten their death, and make their lives miserable thereby. Yet, while they are at it, they every now and then interrupt the general course of conversation, and cry out " Health!" But enough of this folly!

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SINGULAR PHENOMENON.

A REMARKABLE discovery has lately been made on Etna, of a mass of ice, preserved for many ages, perhaps for centuries, from melting, by the singular event of a current of red hot lava having flowed over it. The following are the facts in attestation of a phenomenon which must at first sight appear of so paradoxical a character. The extraordinary heat experienced in the south of Europe during the summer and autumn of 1828, caused the supplies

of snow and ice, which had been preserved in the spring of that year, for the use of Catania and the adjoining parts of Sicily and the neighboring island of Malta, to fail entirely. Considerable distress was felt for the want of a commodity regarded in these countries as one of the necessaries of life rather than an article of luxury, and on the abundance of which, in some large cities, the salubrity of the water and the general health of the people may be

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