120 WILD TRAITS IX TAME ANIMALS. 



groan or two, and is still. Like the fanfare of 

 the baffled Tuscans, his 



"Victorious trumpet-peal 

 Dies fitfully awa_v." 



To many people the terminal gasps and grunts 

 in this fiasco of a peroration appear a fit sub- 

 ject for lauo-hter. But to my imagination thev 

 suggest that a sudden despair, prompted by the 

 memory of his fallen state, has struck him to 

 the heart like a leaden missile when in the full 

 flight of his eloquence. It is as it he said to him- 

 self : " But, after all, what is the use of my old 

 mountain war-cry I I am only a moke nowadays, 

 and I may just as well hold my jaw. Even the 

 Philistines make sport of it now. A day was 



when But — Well! well! I'll cto and look 



for a decent thistle ! " 



Civilisation has used the poor ass badly. Our 

 ways are not his ways, and he not unfrequently 

 reminds us of the fact. When he does express 

 dissent, he shows himselt an uncompromising 

 bis:ot. Yet let us consider for a moment whv he 

 is "such an ass." He has been taken from a 

 bold and free life in the uplands, where the very 

 air tastes of independence, and has been de- 



