180 The Squirrel 



logical gastronomy. So unaccountable, indeed, are sometimes 

 the actions both of man and beast, not only in the eating depart- 

 ment, but also in domestic arrangements, that we might really 

 fancy the performers not to be quite right in their heads. 



Whilst I am actually writing this, there are two geese on the 

 lawn before me. One of them is a Canada goose, the other a 

 barnacle gander. The latter is about half the size of the former. 

 Notwithstanding this disparity, the old fool of a goose has taken 

 the insignificant little fellow into connubial favour, although 

 there are four and twenty others of the Canada species here, 

 from which she has it fully in her power to make a more profit- 

 able choice. Singular to tell, this is the tliird year that these 

 infatuated simpletons have paired, and the goose laid eggs, 

 without any chance of a progeny. And, in high quarters, some- 

 times unions take place, where the husband is ignorant of the 

 language of his wife, and the wife of that of her husband. 



How capricious, then, is the taste, not only of Mr. Wighton's 

 captive squirrels, but also of geese, and eke of man himself! 

 By only " a few days' " loss of liberty, I have shown that Mr. 

 Wighton's pretty squirrel preferred the flesh of birds to its own 

 "favourite kind of food." 



My tom-cat, apparently an excellent mouser, will sometimes 

 eat plentifully of dry biscuit, and turn up his nose at mutton 

 chop. Sterne's ass seemed to relish macaroon. Did all asses 

 relish macaroon, we might doubt the fitness of the Spanish 

 proverb, " La miel no es para la boca del asno : " Honey is not 

 made for the mouth of the ass. Parrots in cages will pull off 

 their own feathers, and eat them by the dozen. Blackbirds, 

 although on very short allowance, caused by the frosty weather, 

 would not touch their favourite ivy berries, which were thrown 

 down in abundance for them in the garden of my friend, Mr. 

 Loudon of Bayswater. I knew a healthy old owl who took 

 her confinement so much to heart that she refused all kind of 

 food, and died at last for want of it. And, when I was in the 

 Mediterranean Sea, I saw a brute in the shape of man, swallow 

 pieces of raw fowl (which he had torn asunder, feathers and 

 all,) with as much avidity as Sir Robert Peel devours our 

 incomes. 



Should Mr. Wighton read this paper, he cannot fail to perceive 

 that I have many serious obstacles to overcome, before I can 

 arrive at the very important conclusion, that the family of 

 squirrel is carnivorous in its own native haunts. 



Walton Hally March 8. 1843. 



