In his picture of "The Cherry-Seller," painted for Mr Higgins of Turvey House, old Odell and his donkey are chief figures.
Gainsborough kept an Ass.
The Rev. William Gilpin, in his "Forest Scenery," refers to the picturesque beauty of the ass in a landscape Berghem often introduced it; "and a late excellent landscape-painter (Mr Gainsborough), I have heard, generally kept this animal by him, that he might have it always at hand to introduce in various attitudes into his pictures. I have heard also that a plaster cast of an ass, modelled by him, is sold in the shops in London."[241]
Irishman on the Ramsgate Donkeys.
In former times, when excise officers were not so sharp, there was a good deal of smuggling carried on at Ramsgate. Sir Thomas Dick Lauder[242] tells an anecdote of an Irishman there, who being asked to name the hardest wrought creature in existence, replied, "Och! a Ramsgate donkey, to be sure; for, faith, afthur carrying angels all day, be the powers he is forced to carry speerits all night."
Ass's Foal.
Douglas Jerrold and a company of literary friends were out in the country. In the course of their walk they stopped to notice the gambols of an ass's foal. A very sentimental poet present vowed that he should like to send the little thing as a present to his mother. "Do," replied Jerrold, "and tie a piece of paper round its neck, bearing this motto, 'When this you see, remember me.'"[243]
Ass.
A judge, joking a young barrister, said—"If you and I were turned into a horse and an ass, which would you prefer to be?"—"The ass, to be sure," replied the barrister. "I've heard of an ass being made a judge, but a horse never."[244]
Ammonianus, the grammarian, had an ass which, as it is said, when he attended the lectures upon poetry, often neglected his food when laid before him, though at the same time he was hungry, so much was the ass taken with the love of poetry.[245]