LII 



Let us again, for a moment, leave the proud horse of the 

 desert, the favorite of the sheik, the pampered but noble 

 companion of the Arab, and turn to his patient, pathetic 

 cousin, the ass. Oh for the pen of a ready writer to draw 

 up an eulogium on this humble martyr ! What panegyric 

 shall do him justice? There is nothing of his breed — 

 there is no animal in the service of man — that so nearly 

 personifies the cardinal virtues. He has positively but 

 one weakness, and that is a failure to understand music 

 as we do. He cannot sing to the contentment of our 

 classical ear. But, despite even this, the more I see of 

 the ass the more sincere is my respect for him. I would 

 fain erect an altar to him and burn incense at his shrine. 

 He may not bear his master company to an equal sky, 

 but surely he deserves a heaven of his own. "Why, when 

 he does such uncomplaining, never-ending work, impious 

 man should not hold him at his true value it is hard to 

 conceive. His toil is remunerated with the meanest food ; 

 his truly heroic efforts are rewarded by a constant shower 

 of blows, by a constant call for greater effort. In Egypt 

 a camel-load of green clover — a quarter-ton — sells for 

 almost a dollar of our money ; a donkey -load for forty 

 cents ; and the camel weighs five or six times as much as 

 the donkey. In other words, the "marvellous" camel 

 bears but one-third his own weight, the donkey four-fifths 

 of his. If you overload the camel he will growl his pro- 

 test ; he will refuse to rise. Whoever heard of the ass re- 



