THE DONKEY. 23 



unappreciated. The connection between a. donkey's voice 

 and his tail is obscure, but undoubted. It is impossible for 

 him to do justice to himself unless his tail be elevated, and 

 advantage has been taken of this peculiarity by man, who is 

 apt at turning the weaknesses of others to his own benefit. 

 It has been found that by attaching a weight to a donkey's 

 tail a brick is sufficient neither the tail nor the voice 

 can be elevated. In this respect it must be owned that the 

 donkey is easier to deal with than a woman ; for while the 

 former can be effectually reduced to silence, no means 

 have hitherto been discovered for suppressing ladies with a 

 mistaken estimate of their vocal abilities. 



Happily of late there has been some slight reaction in 

 favour of the donkey, and the Society for the Prevention of 

 Cruelty to Animals has done something towards impressing 

 upon the minds of the class of men who chiefly utilise the 

 services of the ass that the animal is not altogether in- 

 sensible to pain, that he needs a certain amount of 

 sustenance, and that there is a limit to his draught powers. 

 Why a mistaken idea upon these points should have so long 

 prevailed is by no means clear. That it has prevailed is 

 evident from the fact that a certain class of men brutally 

 misuse donkeys, as they misuse no other creatures save 

 their wives. Men do not take an absolute pleasure in 

 beating dogs ; but no one can doubt that the brute who 

 lays a heavy stick across an unoffending donkey does feel a 

 malicious joy in the pain he gives. Matters are better than 

 they were ; the schoolmaster is abroad, and so are the 

 policeman and the officer of the Society, and between 

 them some slight alleviation of the lot of the ass is in 

 progress. But even now the spectacle of five or six hulking 



