AN ANIMAL THAT HAS SEEN BETTER DAYS.

I wish some one would write a book about the ass, and show us how he became so degenerated, and when he first got into disfavour.

Everybody knows he was an animal of great importance once, and in the East, at the present day, he is ridden by nobles, and is well cared for. Ah! you say, he is a very different animal from our poor ass. Of course he is; there, he is really an elegant animal, full of spirit and of good action; his coat is smooth, and his pace is rapid. But this only proves our point. It is not because he is first dull and stupid that he is ill cared for; but because he is badly treated, that he is the poor, slow, heavy brute we find him.

Even now, we do see some first-rate animals in the shafts of costermongers’ carts, and sometimes of gigs and other vehicles; in these cases, their owners take an interest in them, feed them well, groom them carefully, and oftener use the corn measure than the cudgel.

At recent donkey exhibitions there have been some fine specimens, showing what the race is capable of; but, alas! these are only exceptions, and only make their less fortunate fellows appear more stupid than ever. We see what can be done with kindness with our existing stock; but if some good specimens were brought from the East, might we not have a much better race of donkeys? At one time in this country no doubt we had; but then the ass was an object of religious interest; people remembered how honoured his race had been; he was the only animal on which our Saviour rode, the only one that ever relieved Him of any bodily fatigue and weariness; and so he became celebrated in the early church.

The Feast of the Ass was held on the 14th January, in commemoration of the flight into Egypt. The Holy Family was represented, the ass was led round the town, and then taken into the church, where at the end of the service the priest brayed three times, and the whole congregation “hee-hawed.” A hymn was sung, and in the chorus the braying was imitated:

There! was not he a lucky ass?

Some of you boys are quite irreverent enough to think they were all a set of asses together.

Well, it was certainly a queer proceeding, and one that should never have taken place inside a church.

Why, the priest must have been the original “Vicar of Bray.”

They carried their reverence so far as to declare—and the superstition has been handed down to our time—that the cross that we see on the back of every ass, near the shoulders, is there because of our Saviour’s riding on one into Jerusalem. The fact is, however, that the stripe on the ass shows that it belongs to the same class as the zebra, which has several of them.

This much to show that the ass was treated well at one time; and I remember a friend drawing attention to a verse in the Bible, which proved how different was his nature then from now.

In Proverbs xxvi. 3, it says, “A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass,” as if in those days it was the horse who wanted urging, and the ass that required to be held in. How different now! not only does the ass feel the whip, but the cudgel, rope-end, or anything that comes to hand, and often the foot too.

His body is a mark for stones to be aimed at, if he is grazing by the roadside, or if he meets any one on the road he is considered fair game to whack, in passing. With some men and boys, it is impossible to have a stick without bringing it down upon every donkey they meet with. Some look upon them as animated drums, made on purpose to be beaten; they do not think there is any feeling below that rough hide.

Why, in one stage, an ass’s skin retains the impression of a black lead pencil; and be sure that in its roughest and toughest state it is painfully affected by a cudgel.

The fact is, the poor donkey is not well able to defend himself, as if it were never contemplated he would be so ill-used. It was natural for him to expect the stings of insects and the pricks of brambles, and so he is covered with a thick coating of hair; it was likely he would come across nettles and such things in his quest for food, and so his mouth has been made nettle-proof; but it was never to be expected that a patient, useful, willing, hard-working brute, should be an Ishmael among animals, with every man’s hand against him, and so he is not furnished with any formidable qualities. He does not even run away very rapidly from his enemies; and as to his kicking, he does not often do that, and, when he does, it is not a very sudden affair; but he has always credit given him for being about to kick, and so he gets walloped in anticipation.

Men have found out that he is rather sensitive about his ears, and so the only object of his having them, that they can see, is to furnish them with opportunities to annoy him.

I had one once—there, now, the mere mention of the circumstance makes some of you smile, as if it were a more ridiculous animal than a goat or pig.

The poor donkey is looked upon as a joke; but he would not mind if jokes were the only things cracked upon him—it is the whip and stick that he minds most.

Some have asked, “Why a donkey prefers thistles to grass?”—“Because he’s an ass.” But these playful attacks he doesn’t mind at all; he would only like to put in a word, that he could do with more of them and fewer kicks and blows; but that he would even prefer corn to thistles.