A CRITICISM OF "TEE NEW PAUL AND VIRGINIA." 475 



CUEIOUS ANIMAL-AVERSIONS. 



SOMETIMES, for no very apparent reasons, 

 animals will evince special antipathy tow- 

 ard one out of a crowd of persons. These ani- 

 mal-aversions, as we will call them, are not at all 

 times easily accounted for, seeing that the object 

 of antipathy may be a child, or, as in the follow- 

 ing case, a lady, who we are assured had never 

 given the animals the slightest cause for jealousy 

 or ill-feeling. Our correspondent writes as fol- 

 lows : 



" Some time ago, in company with some of 

 my relatives and friends, I paid a visit to the 

 Zoological Gardens at Clifton. One lady of the 



party, Mrs. M , had traveled with her husband 



in foreign countries, and expressed herself very 

 fearless about wild beasts. Before entering the 

 monkey-house, she informed us there was one 

 monkey which had taken a great dislike to her, 

 and however long a period elapsed between her 

 visits, its recognition of her was almost instan- 

 taneous. The house in which the monkeys were 

 confined had cages round the wall, and a huge 

 one in the centre in which were a large number 

 of all sizes and shades. We entered on the tip- 

 toe of expectation to see if this time it would rec- 

 ognize her. We were not long in determining 

 which was the enemy. One of- the tribe jumped 

 from its perch and clung to the bars nearest to 

 us, chattering and grinning in a frightful manner. 

 Whichever side of the cage we stood the monkey 

 followed, all the time intently watching Mrs. 



M , who had with her ginger snaps and nuts, 



with which she proceeded to feed the other mon- 

 keys. 



" Seeing this, Mrs. M 's enemy sprang 



upon them, seized the food, and threw it back 

 angrily in her face, chattering and screaming in 

 great fury ; and I am not sure if it was not the 

 same monkey that succeeded in tearing off some 



deep lace Mrs. M wore round her mantle, and 



climbing on to the topmost perch, commenced 

 tearing it in pieces. 



" I was not sorry when we left his ugly grin- 

 ning face and screeching voice behind us, and 

 paid a visit to the lion and tiger house. Here, 



Mrs. M informed us, was a tiger which would 



show its dislike as much as the monkey had done. 

 On seeing her, it began to growl fiercely, and 

 turning, walked slowly to the other end of the 

 cage ; then facing us again, he threw himself with 

 great force against the strong bars, which, had 

 they yielded to the shock, would have involved 



certain death to Mrs. M , who, fixing her eyes 



on the enormous beast, and shaking her umbrella 

 at it, exclaimed, 'I should like to tame you.' 

 A gentleman standing near watching the proceed- 

 ings said, ' It is your eye it does not like.' And 



here I should mention, Mrs. M has very dark 



and prominent eyes. After visiting other parts 

 of the gardens, we returned to take a last fare- 

 well of the tiger. It was agreed Mrs. M was 



to stay outside, while some of our party entered, 

 myself among the number. We stood before its 

 cage and commenced to make remarks about 

 it ; but, beyond looking at us very quietly, no fur- 

 ther notice was taken. On the entrance of Mrs. 



M , nearly the same scene ensued as at the 



first visit ; at length the huge animal gave a loud 

 roar, in which all the other lions and tigers joined. 



Nearly all rushed from the place but Mrs. M , 



who stood her ground before the cage while the 

 roaring continued, while the keepers ran in haste 

 to learn the cause of the disturbance. We then 

 left the gardens, commenting on the strange con- 

 duct and knowledge of the monkey and tiger, 

 which after so long a period had recognized and 

 so unmistakably expressed their great dislike to 

 jl rs> M ," — Chambers's Journal. 



A CEITICISM OF "THE NEW PAUL AND VIRGINIA." 



OF all modes of satire none is more effective 

 than satirical allegory ; but this is not a sa- 

 tirical allegory, though it pretends to be one. The 

 method of satirical allegory is this : The satirist 

 invents a story, the central idea of which is the 



very opposite of the theory satirized — which cen- 

 tral idea he proves to be a truth by showing, 

 through the use of narrative, that to suppose his 

 proposition untrue would lead to an obvious con- 

 tradiction or absurdity. The method, in short, is 



