KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



179 



testable sang froid, in the hope of being 

 stared at, and the conviction of being excused 

 on the plea of their odd-fellowship. The 

 world, however, should know that this is, as 

 Sir Hugh says, all " affectation." These 

 gentry are not mad ; they are only bad ; and 

 they richly deserve a horsewhip for their 

 pains. Not so an unfortunate set of oddities, 

 peculiar to aristocratic circles, or (to be more 

 precise) among estated country gentlemen. 

 These unfortunate persons are chiefly notice- 

 able for a morbid shyness and mauvais honte, 

 which plunges them into a thousand eccen- 

 tricities. The appearance of a stranger, for 

 example, throws them into a flutter ; and the 

 necessity of saying " How do you do ? " to 

 their banker or their coachmaker, will haunt 

 them for a week beforehand. If they see an 

 unknown face approaching, they will turn 

 down the dirtiest lane to avoid the casual 

 meeting ; and, if they have no parliamentary 

 ambition, they double-lock their park-gates 

 to exclude the public. In society, they are 

 only happy with the curate ; who is just suf- 

 ficiently a gentleman to be fit company for 

 them, yet sufficiently dependent to put them 

 perfectly at their ease. The physician they 

 would tolerate, if they saw him oftener ; and 

 if they did not suspect him of being either a 

 wit or freethinker. But they enjoy the pleni- 

 tude of their existence only when, looking 

 from the elevation of the crimson-lined pew 

 of their own church, at the edge of their own 

 domain, they frown terror upon a passive and 

 trembling tenantry. This dread of equals 

 and superiors might be mistaken for humility, 

 and for a constitutional or habitual distrust 

 of self : but the reverse is the truth. 



The oddity has its origin very clearly in 

 an insane development of pride. The patient 

 is altogether occupied with himself, and his 

 own consequence. He thinks the eyes of 

 the whole world must be on him, and he fears 

 that his slightest inadvertence will not 

 escape notice. If he is afraid to measure 

 himself with his equals, it is not so much that 

 he thinks he will prove below the standard, 

 but because he is desirous of passing for a 

 giant, and an instinctive knowledge that omne 

 ignotum pro magnijico est. A really modest 

 man is at his ease in all societies ; for the 

 last thing that enters his mind is, that the 

 world will take the trouble of noticing him, 

 or will care three straws what he thinks, or 

 what he does : but your shy people are so 

 vastly conceited ! 



Of all the pretenders to oddity, the odd 

 fellows who assume to themselves that title, 

 par excellence, and who congregate in clubs 

 for the sake of being facetious, are every way 

 the least worthy of the appellation. Essen- 

 tially common-place and vulgar, if they are 

 gay, they are mischievous ; and, if dull, they 

 are downright stupid. Priding themselves 



upon eccentricity, they go to bed as regularly 

 — " drunk as a lord ; " and, trading upon 

 their humor, they are as lively as a land- 

 carriage mackerel. The only genuine point 

 of oddity about them, is, that they can find 

 amusement in the nightly repetition of the 

 same jokes and the same songs. They are, 

 for the most part, painstaking tradesmen, 

 with as much imagination as goes to the 

 puffing of a bad article. They mistake 

 brandy-and- water for fun, and tobacco smoke 

 for good company. At bottom, however, 

 they are, in their way, very good sort of 

 persons : and if they do not catch the at- 

 tention of the world, they do not claim it, 

 but confine their pretensions to oddity very 

 closely to their own family fireside and the 

 club-room. 



There remains but one " odd fellow" more 

 to be noticed ; and of that one there is very 

 little to be said. Whether this arises from 

 anything peculiar and undescribable in his 

 distinguishing traits, or from the rarity of 

 the individuals making the class less worthy 

 of a detailed disquisition, I leave to the 

 sagacity of the reader to determine. If he 

 be a reader of any apprehension worth speak- 

 ing of, he will not require to be told that the 

 odd fellow in question is, that rara avis in 

 terris — an honest man ! 



ClT. 

 ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE. 



Trout introduced in New Zealand. — I beg to 

 observe that, for the last four or five years, I have 

 successfully carried out the artificial breeding of 

 trout in the Wandle. About two years ago, a 

 gentleman applied to me for some spawn to take 

 out to New Zealand, for the purpose of stocking 

 the rivers there. I am glad to say that the experi- 

 ment has been entirely successful ; and he has 

 claimed from the government the reward offered 

 to "the first who would introduce trout into that 

 country." The spawn was taken out in tanks, 

 with Valisneria, acccording to Mr. Warrington's 

 system. — S. Gurney, Jun., Carshalton. 



[To the above, which appeared in the Agricul- 

 tural Gazette" T. G., of CHtheroe, replies as 

 follows : — " Mr. Gurney states in the Agricultural 

 Gazette^ that he furnished a friend with trout spawn 

 from the Wandle, which he succeeded in hatching 

 and carrying safely to New Zealand, by Mr. War- 

 rington's process of purifying the water by means 

 of the Valisneria. Mr. Gurney would oblige me, 

 and doubtless many other naturalists, if he would 

 describe the process in detail. I fancy I under- 

 stand Mr. Warrington's plan pretty well ; but the 

 fact of trout-spawn hatching in stagnant water is 

 new to me, and it will materially facilitate the 

 breeding of trout and salmon if this can be done 

 regularly. If Mr. Gurney will kindly give all the 

 details, so far as he is aware of them (such as the 

 time the spawn was taken, the size of the vessel 

 it was put into, whether it was deposited upon 

 gravel ; the number of plants of Valisneria ; now 

 often the water was changed during the voyage ; 



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