Graham's Magazine, Vol. XLI, No. 1, July 1852Various
General
Graham's Magazine, Vol. XLI, No. 1, July 1852
Various
Literature -- Periodicals; Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals
in savage joy, whilst his flashing eyes glared upon the spectators, and
his tail was swung from side to side with an expression of defiance. It
was a splendid, but a fearful sight. One of my friends was accustomed
sometimes to visit these animals in company with his little girl, a
beautiful child, with a complexion like milk and cherries. The sight of
her invariably produced great excitement in the lions. They seemed
evidently to show their love to her in a ravenous manner.
The serpents were motionless in their glass house, and lay, half asleep,
curled around the trunks of trees. In the evening, by lamp light, they
become lively, and then, twisting about and flashing forth their snaky
splendors, they present a fine spectacle. The snake-room, with its walls
of glass, behind which the snakes live, reminded me of the old northern
myth of Nastrond, the roof of which was woven of snakes’ backs, the
final home of the ungodly—an unpleasant, but vigorous picture. The most
disagreeable and ugliest of all the snakes, was that little snake which
the beautiful Queen Cleopatra, herself false as a serpent, placed at her
breast; a little, gray, flat-headed snake, which liked to bury itself in
the sand.
The monkey-family lead a sad life; stretch out their hands for nuts or
for bread, with mournful human gestures; contentious, beaten, oppressed,
thrust aside, frightening one another, the stronger the
weaker—mournfully human also.
Sad, also, was the sight of an ourang-outang, spite of all its queer
grimaces, solitary in its house, for it evidently suffered _ennui_, was
restless, and would go out. It embraced its keeper and kissed him with
real human tenderness. The countenance, so human, yet without any human
intelligence, made a painful impression upon me: so did the friendly,
tame creature here, longing for its fellows, and seeing around it only
human beings. Thou poor animal! Fain would I have seen thee in the
primeval woods of Africa, caressing thy wife in the clear moonlight of
the tropical night, sporting with her among the branches of the trees,
and sleeping upon them, rocked by the warm night wind. There thy
ugliness would have had a sort of picturesque beauty. After the strange
beast-man had climbed hither and thither along the iron railing, seizing
the bars with his hands, and feet—which resembled hands—and also with
his teeth, he took a white, woolen blanket, wrapped it around him in a
very complicated manner, and ended by laying himself down as a human
being might do, in his chilly, desolate room. They say that he will not
live long in this country.[4]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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