Read Ebook: The Mirror of Literature Amusement and Instruction. Volume 20 No. 556 July 7 1832 by Various

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THE MIRROR OF LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.

SURREY ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS.

We commenced our last volume with three Vignette Views in the Surrey Zoological Gardens. The season was then cold and ungenial, the trees leafless; in short, it was about mid-winter, but the magic pencil of our artist invested his scenes with all the pride of summer. Upon the present occasion, our Engravings need not the aid of his creative fancy. The Gardens are now

made glorious by the summer sun

--the weather and the public are all propitious, and hundreds of gaily dressed folks are flocking to inspect the zoological and botanical curiosities of the place.

But we are forgetting the zoological tenants. The visiter enters by a broad walk, beside which Parrots, Maccaws, and Cockatoos are uncaged on perches; so that we may almost say with Montgomery:--

The blossoms swung like blossoms on the trees.

Next is an enclosure containing two pair of fine Pelicans, and the solitary kennels of an Alpine and Cuban Dog: the Armadillo house, with a pair of eight-banded inmates: near the latter a sty or cage is preparing for Porcupines. At this extremity of the grounds, is the Deer paddock, with about forty specimens, among which the Axis or spotted varieties are very beautiful. We now reach a picturesque group of rock-work, , the lower part of which is intended for Beavers, the upper craigs being at present occupied by Vultures and Eagles. The rock-work consists chiefly of granite, with a few masses of the rock of Gibraltar.

Of the lake, hermitage, and boathouse we have already spoken. The long, or rather semicircular, glazed building is now finished for the Monkeys, as is an adjoining house for large birds of prey: here we should notice a fine Ruppell Vulture, from Senegal, a chanting Falcon from Brazil, and a white Hawk, from New Holland, the latter especially rare in this country.

Among the improvements we ought not to omit the affixing of the scientific and popular names to the abodes of the respective animals. This is one of the beneficial results of the honorary aid of Messrs. Swainson and Gray, the distinguished zoologists.

THE LATE MR. COLTON.

Having observed in several papers and periodicals, sketches of "the late Mr. Colton," and none of these tending, in my opinion, to convey a correct idea of the character of this extraordinary man; allow me to offer you a slight sketch of the latter period of his life.

Mr. Colton, or as he was vulgarly called, Parson Colton, arrived in Paris in the year 1825 or 1826, from America, to which country he sailed from England shortly previous to the murder of Weare. He was at that time in possession of very little money; this small stock he increased by borrowing upon the security of some valuable jewellery which he took out from his creditors in this country. With this sum he commenced his career as player at the public gaming-tables in Paris, more particularly that at 154 in the Palais Royal. The system upon which he played was at once bold and original, and attended with great success. I have good authority for stating, he was at one period a winner of upwards of ?10,000. He subsequently lost nearly half this sum, and he expended the remainder in paintings by the ancient masters, of which, in the year 1828, he had a splendid collection. These pictures he intended for the English market; but in the latter part of the same year, he became unfortunate at the gambling tables, and they were parted with by degress, the proceeds lost, and their late owner, in a short time, reduced to beggary, or nearly so. His last literary labour, if it is worthy of the name, was a history of the Three Days of July, published by Galignani.

Although generally considered mean, I have much pleasure in stating that I have known him perform many acts of charity, frequently giving a dinner to some one of his reduced countrymen, and occasionally assisting them with small sums of money. It has been stated that the dread of an operation which became necessary for a complaint under which he laboured, was the cause of his suicide; this I much doubt, since I have never met with a man of greater fortitude and stronger nerve. I am rather disposed to think that the depressed state of his finances, severing the only hold he had on his dissolute associates, and the attention paid too often to wealth, though accompanied by vice, having disappeared, he found himself pennyless and despised; he was without religious consolation; his health declined, his spirits were broken; he was, and felt himself, alone in the world, without friends and without commiseration, and in a moment of desperation he put a period to his reckless existence.

W.W.

KING KENULPH'S DAUGHTER.

P.S.

SPIRIT OF DISCOVERY.

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

The Oyster Bay and Big River tribes, the most sanguinary in the island, have surrendered themselves to Mr. Robinson, by whose conciliatory intervention the desirable event has been mainly brought about. On the 7th of January, Mr. Robinson made his triumphant entry into Hobart Town with his party of blacks, amounting in all to forty. They walked very leisurely along the road, followed by a large pack of dogs, and were received by the inhabitants on their entry into town with the most lively curiosity and delight. Soon after their arrival they walked up to the Government House, and were introduced to his Excellency, and the interview that took place was truly interesting. They are delighted at the idea of proceeding to Great Island, where they will enjoy peace and plenty uninterrupted. The great susceptibility which they one and all evinced of the influence of music when the band struck up, which Colonel Logan had purposely ordered down, clearly showed the numerous spectators the power of this agent of communication, even in the savage breast. After, in the greatest good humour, and with an evident desire to make themselves agreeable, going through various feats of their wonderful dexterity, they proceeded on board the Swan River packet, until the Tamar is ready to proceed with them to Great Island. The women were frightfully ornamented with human bones hung round them in various fantastic forms, even to the rows of teeth and skulls. Some of these were the remains of enemies, and white persons whom they had killed, but more as the mementos of the affection which they bore to the husband or children whom they had lost. They each carried a handful of spears. They wore the usual kangaroo skin cloak thrown over the back or shoulder, and thickly smeared with red ochre and grease. Their hair as well as skin was also thickly coated with the same, the hair being carefully dressed or formed by its help into neat little knots or globules all round the head. One of the men has lost his arm, being the same who about two years ago was caught in the rat trap that happened to be set in the flour cask in Mr. Adey's stock-keeper's hut. They surrendered to Mr. Robinson six stand of arms, which they had taken from the whites they had murdered, or stolen from the huts. Three of them were ready loaded, and the muzzles carefully stuffed with pieces of blanket, and one is the same which was so recently borne by the late unfortunate Mr. Parker. The inside of several of their bark huts, which Mr. Robinson entered, was very ingeniously ornamented with rude delineations of kangaroos, emus, and other animals. The removal of these blacks will be of essential benefit both to themselves and the colony. The large tracts of pasture that have so long been deserted, owing to their murderous attacks on the shepherds and the stockhuts, will now be available, and a very sensible relief will be afforded to the flocks of sheep that had been withdrawn from them, and pent up on inadequate ranges of pasture--a circumstance which indeed has tended materially to impoverish the flocks and keep up the price of butcher's meat.

The dogs which these poor people have nursed and bred up in order to assist them in hunting the kangaroo, have latterly become so numerous and wild as to be a very serious and alarming nuisance to the settlers, committing on many farms nightly ravages on their flocks. In the neighbourhood of Benlomond they are particularly troublesome, and are so wild and savage as to set even men at defiance. Notwithstanding this, however, the numbers of the kangaroo seem daily and rapidly to increase. Whether this arises from the latterly diminished slaughter among them, owing to the decrease of the blacks who formerly fed upon them, or from the effects of the Dog Act, which induced many to destroy their dogs and to desist from the chase, or from the relish which the animal itself has acquired for the corn and other artificial food it finds upon the cultivated farms, we cannot say, but certain it is, that not only patches, but whole acres of corn in many situations are this year destroyed by their nightly inroads, coming as they do in droves of fifties and hundreds. As an instance we may mention that on Mr. Gunn's farm at the Coal River alone, a fine field of five acres of wheat has lately been completely eaten down by them. Many persons are in consequence falling on the expedient of catching them in wires and pitfalls in order to diminish them.

The ravages committed by the opossums, in like manner, are almost equally ruinous to the hopes of the farmer, in addition to the attacks of bandicoots, kangaroo rats, and the other almost innumerable species of small quadrupeds that every where inhabit the wild bush and underwood of this island. Mr. Nicholas, of the Clyde, accompanied by his servant, lately, in the course of half a dozen evenings, and within the range of a moderate-sized field, killed no less than 340 of these opussums in the immediate vicinity of his own house.

THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

LORD BYRON.

JOURNAL OF CONVERSATIONS WITH LORD BYRON.

In all his conversations relative to Lady Byron, and they are frequent, he declares that he is totally unconscious of the cause of her leaving him, but suspects that the illnatured interposition of Mrs. Charlemont led to it. It is a strange business! He declares that he left no means untried to effect a reconciliation, and always adds with bitterness, "A day will arrive when I shall be avenged. I feel that I shall not live long, and when the grave has closed over me, what must she feel?" All who wish well to Lady Byron must desire that she should not survive her husband, for the all-atoning grave that gives oblivion to the errors of the dead, clothes those of the living in such sombre colours to their own too-late awakened feelings, as to render them wretched for life, and more than avenges the real, or imagined wrongs of those we have lost for ever.

When Lord Byron was praising the mental and personal qualifications of Lady Byron, I asked him how all that he now said agreed with certain sarcasms supposed to bear a reference to her, in his works. He smiled, shook his head, and said they were meant to spite and vex her, when he was wounded and irritated at her refusing to receive or answer his letters; that he was not sincere in his implied censures, and that he was sorry he had written them; but notwithstanding this regret, and all his good resolutions to avoid similar sins, he might on renewed provocation recur to the same vengeance, though he allowed it was petty and unworthy of him. Lord Byron speaks of his sister, Mrs. Leigh, constantly, and always with strong expressions of affection; he says she is the most faultless person he ever knew, and that she was his only source of consolation in his troubles on the separation.

He affects to dislike hearing his works praised or referred to; I say affects, because I am sure it is not real or natural; as he who loves praise, as Byron evidently does, in other things, cannot dislike it for that in which he must be conscious it is deserved. He refers to his feats in horsemanship, shooting at a mark, and swimming, in a way that proves he likes to be complimented on them; and nothing appears to give him more satisfaction than being considered a man of fashion, who had great success in fashionable society in London, when he resided there. He is peculiarly compassionate to the poor; I remarked that he rarely, in our rides, passed a mendicant without giving him charity, which was invariably bestowed with gentleness and kindness; this was still more observable if the person was deformed, as if he sympathized with the object.

Rouchefoucault.

ODE TO THE GERMANS.

BY THOMAS CAMPBELL, ESQ.

With Freedom's lion-banner Britannia rules the waves Whilst your BROAD STONE OF HONOUR Is still the camp of slaves. For shame, for glory's sake, Wake, Allemanians, wake, And the tyrants now that whelm Half the world, shall quail and flee, When your realm shall be the realm Of the free--of the free!

The Press's magic letters That blessing ye brought forth, Behold! it lies in fetters On the soil that gave it birth: But the trumpet must be heard And the charger must be spurr'd; For your father Armin's Sprite Calls down from heaven, that ye Shall gird you for the fight And be free!--and be free!

Germany invented gunpowder, clock-making, and printing.

GAZEL.

BY THOMAS MOORE, ESQ.

Haste, Maami, the spring is nigh, Already, in th' unopened flowers That sleep around us, Fancy's eye Can see the blush of future bowers; And joy it brings to thee and me, My own beloved Maami!

The streamlet, frozen on its way, To feed the marble Founts of Kings, Now, loosen'd by the vernal ray, Upon its path exulting springs, As doth this bounding heart to thee, My ever blissful Maami!

Such bright hours were not made to stay, Enough if they awhile remain; Like Irem's bowers, that fade away, From time to time, and come again, And life shall all one Irem be For us, my gentle Maami.

O haste, for this impatient heart Is like the rose in Yemen's vale, That rends its inmost leaves apart With passion for the nightingale; So languishes this soul for thee, My bright and blushing Maami!

NOTES OF A READER.

ADVICE, BY A MAN OF THE WORLD.

I am desirous of writing a book which shall be all truth, a work of which the passion, the thought, the action, and even the style, should spring from my own experience of feeling, from the meditations of my own intellect, from my own observation of incident, from my own study of the genius of expression.

I wish you to mix as much as is convenient with society. I apprehend that you have, perhaps, hitherto indulged a little too much in lonely habits. Young men are apt to get a little abstracted, and occasionally to think that there is something singular in their nature, when the fact is, if they were better acquainted with their fellow creatures, they would find they were mistaken. This is a common error, indeed the commonest. I am not at all surprised that you have fallen into it. All have. The most practical business-like men that exist have many of them, when children, conceived themselves totally disqualified to struggle in the world. You may rest assured of this. I could mention many remarkable instances. All persons, when young, are fond of solitude, and, when they are beginning to think, are sometimes surprised at their own thoughts. There is nothing to be deplored, scarcely to be feared, in this. It almost always wears off; but sometimes it happens, that they have not judicious friends by them to explain, that the habits which they think peculiar are universal, and, if unreasonably indulged, can ultimately only turn them into indolent, insignificant members of society, and occasion them lasting unhappiness.

But to enter society with pleasure, you must be qualified for it. I think it quite time for you to make yourself master of some accomplishments. Decidedly you should make yourself a good dancer. Without dancing, you can never attain a perfectly graceful carriage, which is of the highest importance in life, and should be every man's ambition. You are yet too young fully to comprehend, how much in life depends upon manner. Whenever you see a man, who is successful in society, try to discover what makes him pleasing, and, if possible, adopt his system. You should learn to fence. For languages, at present, French will be sufficient. You speak it fairly: try to speak it elegantly. Read French authors. Read Rouchefoucault. The French writers are the finest in the world, for they clear our heads of ridiculous ideas. Study precision.

Talk to women, talk to women as much as you can. This is the best school. This is the way to gain fluency--because you need not care what you say, and had better not be sensible. They too will rally you on many points, and, as they are women, you will not be offended. Nothing is of so much importance, and of so much use, to a young man entering life, as to be well criticised by women. It is impossible to get rid of those thousand bad habits, which we pick up in boyhood, without this supervision. Unfortunately, you have no sisters. But never be offended if a woman rally you. Encourage her. Otherwise, you will never be free from your awkwardness, or any little oddities, and certainly never learn to dress.

You ride pretty well, but you had better go through the man?ge. Every gentleman should be a perfect cavalier.

As you are to be at home for so short a time, and for other reasons, I think it better that you should not have a tutor in the house. Parcel out your morning, then, for your separate masters. Rise early and regularly, and read for three hours. Read the Memoirs of the Cardinal de Retz--the Life of Richelieu--everything about Napoleon,--read works of that kind. Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory. Then fence. Talk an hour with your French master, but do not throw the burden of the conversation upon him. Give him an account of something. Describe to him the events of yesterday, or give him a detailed account of the constitution. You will have then sufficiently rested yourself for your dancing. And after that ride and amuse yourself as much as you can. Amusement to an observing mind is study.

I pursued the system which my father had pointed out, with exactness, and soon with pleasure. I sacredly observed my hours of reading, and devoted myself to the study of the lives of what my father considered really great men--that is to say, men of great energies, and violent volition, who look upon their fellow creatures as mere tools, with which they can build up a pedestal for their solitary statue, and who sacrifice every feeling which should sway humanity, and every high work which genius should really achieve, to the short-sighted gratification of an irrational and outrageous selfism. As for my manners, I flattered myself that they advanced in measure with my mind, although I already emulated Napoleon. I soon overcame the fear which attended my first experiments in society, and by scrupulously observing the paternal maxims, I soon became very self-satisfied. I listened to men with a delightful mixture of defference and self-confidence: were they old, and did I differ with them, I contented myself by positively stating my opinion in a most subdued voice, and then either turning the subject, or turning upon my heel. But as for women, it is astonishing how well I got on. The nervous rapidity of my first rattle soon subsided into a continuous flow of easy nonsense. Impertinent and flippant, I was universally hailed an original and a wit. But the most remarkable incident was, that the baroness and myself became the greatest friends. I was her constant attendant, and rehearsed to her flattered ear all my evening performance. She was the person with whom I practised, and as she had a taste in dress, I encouraged her opinions. Unconscious that she was at once my lay figure and my mirror, she loaded me with presents, and announced to all her coterie, that I was the most delightful young man of her acquaintance.

From all this it may easily be suspected, that at the age of fifteen I had unexpectedly become one of the most affected, conceited, and intolerable atoms that ever peopled the sunbeam of society.

PETITION TO TIME.

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