KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



165 



bullfinch and the blackbird, the parrot and the 

 raven can learn, the one to sing, and the other 

 to speak ; and it will even be necessary to forget 

 the marvellous construction of the nests of birds. 

 If the march of thought is so mechanical, that it 

 is the touch which arranges the ideas in better 

 order, because it acts slowly, separately, and suc- 

 cessively upon objects, it would be to the sight, 

 which, at a glance, contemplates the universe, 

 that we should attribute the advantage of giving 

 ideas the most prompt, the most general, and the 

 most extended. If touch possesses the admirable 

 faculty of correcting the errors of the mind, let 

 us be shown a single error, moral or physical, 

 from which the touch of man or animals has de- 

 livered us. Let the maniac, who thinks that he 

 unceasingly hears strange voices whisper in his 

 ear, and who is continually tormented by ima- 

 ginary insects, exhaust himself perpetually in 

 useless efforts to seize the insupportable prattler 

 and the troublesome insect; let him, in his amo- 

 rous delirium, have discovered a thousand times 

 that he embraced nothing; the voices, neverthe- 

 less, continue to whisper, the insects to harass 

 hiru, and he embraces a thousand times more 

 the phantom of his ardent imagination. If it be 

 to the hands, that the origin of inventions and 

 arts is due, why do idiots and simpletons never 

 invent anything? "Why does the painter let fall 

 his pencil, the sculptor his chisel, and the archi- 

 tect his compass, as soon as their minds become 

 deranged ? How, on the contrary, doesit happen, 

 that men born without hands and without feet, 

 have very just ideas of distances, forms, &c, and 

 that other individuals, whose hands have been 

 wholly amputated, execute surprising feats with 

 the stumps ? Why have artists, up to the present 

 time, never found the secret of judging of the 

 talents of their pupils, by the conformation of 

 their hands? 



Although it be true, that some muscles of the 

 hand are wanting in monkeys, yet they can hold 

 the smallest objects between the thumb and fore- 

 finger ; they seize the finest hairs ; they grasp and 

 carry in the same manner as men ; they untie the 

 most complicated knots, using their fingers and 

 their teeth like men; they even employ their 

 hind feet for all these purposes; and yet they 

 have never invented a tool or a process of art. 

 They do not want, any more than the dog and 

 the cat, the ability to carry ; why, then, do these 

 animals, notwithstanding the possession of so 

 many faculties, never arrive at the idea of car- 

 rying wood to a fire, though at the same time 

 they are shivering with cold ? 



LADIES' "PET" FANCIES- 

 DO GS. 



Dear Mr. Editor, 



In the full hope that a more eloquent pen than 

 mine would exert itself in behalf of " Ladies 

 accompanied by dogs," I have been silent awhile. 

 Triumphing, rather prematurely as it now proves, 

 in my anticipation, I have just hastily seized 

 your Journal and therein read — " A Younger 

 Brother's " exhortation again to raise your voice, 

 after it had, I thought, spoken in sufficiently 

 distinct tones to satisfy the most fastidious. 



Thankful that (in mercy or contempt?) your 

 correspondent particularises only " great girls, 

 little girls, and grown-up women " — to these I 

 leave him ; satisfied they will fight their own 

 cause far better than I could. But as the 

 elderly and the old are (in charity! I trust) 

 spared, will he allow me,, through yonr kind per- 

 mission, as one among the latter, to tell him 

 that the practice he condemns is not, as might 

 be inferred from his truly flattering article, 

 restricted to this country. He may limit his 

 travels to the Tuileries, or extend them to Ger- 

 many and Italy; and he will find the custom of 

 ladies being accompanied by dogs, obtains else- 

 where than in England. Some years since, 

 the beautiful Russian Princess Naritschlain, 

 was accompanied, I think, by six. Why should 

 the leader be considered an aggravating, not an 

 extenuating circumstance? Its object is, to pre- 

 vent the loss of the animals, their getting in the 

 way of carriages to their own detriment, or bark- 

 ing at horses' heels to that of the riders' — in 

 short, to protect the dog, and to preclude the 

 possibility of his annoying the most captiously 

 critical. In Paris, at least when I was there, I 

 may presume it was favorably judged of ; dogs 

 not' being allowed in the public walks except 

 en laisse. " My brother " obligingly places at 

 my disposition the lithograph of this morning's 

 Charivari, in proof that the regulation still con- 

 tinues in force. " What a treat for the hus- 

 bands I " observes the Younger Brother. I have 

 never, in my experience, had the opportunity of 

 remarking that husbands are backward or 

 timid in exacting compliance to their wishes, 

 fancies, and caprices. Is it not mauvaise vouloir 

 then to enlighten or persuade them, that what 

 they have not as yet (generally at least) placed 

 in the black list of offences, is one to be repro- 

 bated accordingly? May I further venture, 

 without heinously sinning " against common 

 decorum," to inquire whether the Younger Bro- 

 the'r, or the husbands whose devoted champion 

 he has constituted himself — ever smoke? 

 " Disgusting, immodest, shameless atrocity" — 

 these are somewhat strong epithets it seems to 

 me to apply, even to the grave offence of fond- 

 ling a dog. I cannot help asking myself what 

 terms the writer would resort to, were the most 

 flagrant breach of morality, or the most revolting 

 instance of human depravity, the subject of his 

 animadversion? " Unblushingly fondling dogs 

 in public !" Would the matter be mended by 

 blushing, thereby implying a consciousness of 

 impropriety, and at the same time a resolution to 

 outbrave it? Would your correspondent prefer 

 that, having admired a lady unattended by dogs 

 in public, he should make the discovery, when 

 too late perhaps, that in private she came under 

 his ban? Does he recollect a certain tale in the 

 " Arabian Nights," of an extremely refined lady 

 who ate rice by the grain? Lest he think I am 

 more angry than reasonable, I will generously 

 afford him either a laugh at my expense, or 

 perhaps a proof that I am a " most horrible" and 

 incorrigible offender. Coming down rather late 

 some years since, ready for a concert, in a new 

 dress, my dog jumped upon me, and made a tear 

 —only one, but it was from the waist to the hem. 

 There was no concealing the disaster or the 



