THE MONKE Y FAMIL Y. 165 



whither I had written the day before to my friends who are fond of 

 natural history, and urged them to lose no time in paying a visit to the 

 little chimpanzee, as its health was visibly on the decline. I left Scar- 

 borough soon after, and on the very day on which I went to Wake- 

 field, the poor little African stranger was lying dead in the apartment 

 which it had occupied. Mr Wombwell begged that I would accept it. 

 I did so; but, as he had already sent word to Huddersfield, that his 

 chimpanzee would be shown there, so soon as he had made a suffi- 

 cient sojourn in Wakefield, I suggested the idea that, although his 

 poor ape was dead, he would do well to take it with him, in order 

 that the public of Huddersfield might be gratified in having an 

 opportunity to inspect so singular an animal, so rarely seen in this 

 country. I added, that it might be forwarded to me when he had 

 no more use for it, as the frosty state of the weather was all in its 

 favour. 



The man whom he commissioned to bring it to me had a cousin 

 in Leeds, a fiddler and a soldier by profession. So in lieu of coming 

 straight to Walton Hall, the fellow took off to LeedSj quite out ot 

 the direct line, in order to enjoy the company of his cousin the 

 musician, and to hear him talk of battles lost, and others won. 

 They both got drunk the first evening, as the man who had taken 

 charge of the dead ape afterwards confessed to me, when I questioned 

 him concerning his non-appearance at the time appointed. But my 

 disappointment did not end there; for, instead of pursuing his 

 journey on the morrow, this unthinking porter passed another day 

 of mirth and mental excitement with his loving relative, and then 

 another day after that. So, alas, the chimpanzee only reached me 

 late on Sunday evening, notwithstanding that I had expected it on 

 the Wednesday. This provoking loss of time cost me full five hours 

 of nocturnal labour with the dissecting knife. After seven weeks of 

 application I succeeded in restoring its form and features. Hollow 

 to the very nails, it now sits upon a cocoa-nut (not, - the way, its 

 correct position), which I brought with me from Guiana in the year 

 1817. Unless accident destroy this ape (as it has been totally im- 

 mersed in a solution of corrosive sublimate and alcohol, see the 

 " Wanderings "), it will remain, for ages yet to come, free from mould 

 and from the depredations of the moth ; and without any wires, or 



