Lady Holland relates a practical joke of her father's, which the witty canon carried out at his rectory of Combe Florey. "Opposite was a beautiful bank, with a hanging wood of fine old beech and oak, on the summit of which presented themselves, to our astonished eyes, two donkeys with deers' antlers fastened on their heads, which ever and anon they shook, much wondering at their horned honours; whilst the attendant donkey boy, in Sunday garb, stood grinning and blushing at their side. 'There, Lady ——! you said the only thing this place wanted to make it perfect was deer; what do you say now? I have, you see, ordered my game gamekeeper to drive my deer into the most picturesque point of view. Excuse their long ears, a little peculiarity belonging to parsonic deer. Their voices, too, are singular; but we do our best for you, and you are too true a friend of the Church to mention our defects.' All this, of course, amidst shouts of laughter, whilst his own merry laugh might be heard above us all, ringing through the valley, and making the very echoes laugh in chorus."
Asses' Duty Free!
During the debate on Sir Robert Peel's tariff, the admission of asses' duty free caused much merriment. Lord T., who had just read "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation," remarked that the House had, he supposed, passed the donkey clause out of respect to its ancestors.—"It is a wise measure," said a popular novelist, "especially as it affects the importation of food; for, should a scarcity come, we should otherwise have to fall back on the food of our forefathers."—"And, pray, what is that?" asked an archæologist.—"Thistles," replied Lord T.[250]
Thackeray and the Egyptian Donkey.
When the English author landed at Alexandria, there were many scenes and sounds to dispel all romantic notions; among these "a yelling chorus of donkey boys shrieking, 'Ride, sir!—donkey, sir!—I say, sir!' in excellent English. The placid sphinxes, brooding o'er the Nile, disappeared with that wild shriek of the donkey boys. You might be as well impressed with Wapping as with your first step on Egyptian soil.
"The riding of a donkey is, after all, not a dignified occupation. A man resists the offer first, somehow as an indignity. How is that poor little, red-saddled, long-eared creature to carry you? Is there to be one for you and another for your legs? Natives and Europeans, of all sizes, passed by, it is true, mounted upon the same contrivance. I waited until I got into a very private spot, where nobody could see me, and then ascended—why not say descended at once?—on the poor little animal. Instead of being crushed at once, as perhaps the writer expected, it darted forward, quite briskly and cheerfully, at six or seven miles an hour; requiring no spur or admonitive to haste, except the shrieking of the little Egyptian gamin, who ran along by asinus's side."[251]
Best to let Mules have their own Way.
Dr John Moore, in crossing the Alps, found they had nothing but the sagacity of their mules to trust to. "For my own part," he says, "I was very soon convinced that it was much safer on all dubious occasions to depend on theirs than on my own. For as often as I was presented with a choice of difficulties, and the mule and I were of different opinions, if, becoming more obstinate than he, I insisted on his taking my track, I never failed to repent it, and often was obliged to return to the place where the controversy had begun, and follow the path to which he had pointed at first.
"It is entertaining to observe the prudence of these animals in making their way down such dangerous rocks. They sometimes put their heads over the edge of the precipice, and examine with anxious circumspection every possible way by which they can descend, and at length are sure to fix on that which, upon the whole, is the best. Having observed this in several instances, I laid the bridle on the neck of my mule, and allowed him to take his own way, without presuming to control him in the smallest degree. This is doubtless the best method, and what I recommend to all my friends in their journey through life, when they have mules for their companions."[252]