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REVIEWS FROM THE WEST.
126 the yell of hounds, and mountain echoes-what an asseciatioit of rapturous ideas does the contemplation of these few bones inspire. Go, Mr. Crampton, and all ye petty pursuers of foxes and hares, and, at the sight of such lordly game, learn the meritorious deeds of your ancestors. And then if we only look to the more substantial side of the picture-.the feast; Oh ! ye gourmands of modern days, let not your "too solid gums dissolve into saliva" at the mere idea of such a haunch of venison-
sounding of bugles,
REVIEWS FROM THE WEST. Description of the Fossil Deer of Ireland, (cemus megaurus) in the Museum of the Royal Dublin Society." By JOHN HART, Surgeon. "
"Insulam
cervornm
venatu
insignem."—BEDE.
WE should be unworthy of the name cf Western Critics, did we not welcome this splendid ornament of our bogs from its lowly dwelling to its new habitation in the Museum of the Royal Dublin Society. It is, indeed, a magnificent skele.ton ; majestic even in ruin, and creditable to the land of its nativity; looking down seemingly with contempt on the petty curiosities, such as stuffed birds, bottled snakes, and Eastern idols,which make up a display around this august representative of an extinct race and the royalty of its species. What would not the spectator of so sublime a relic give to see it bound once more upon its native hills, clothed with flesh, and endued with its pristine vigour and beauty ? only imagine what a spectacle ! Six feet six inches in height, ten feet ten in length ; the loftiness of
"
A picture for painters to study, The fat was so white, the lean was su
ruddy." But the praises of such delicious food we must leave to some fitter minstrel. We shall, therefore, content onrselves with recording the little that is known of this ence beautiful animal, and the history of its resurrection, an account of which has been lately published in a tract by Mr. HART of Dublin ; but the importance of such an acquisition to organic remains should secure it a more diffused notoriety than the circulation of
such a work is calculated to afford. The particulars of the discovery may the cameleopard, the graceful agility pecu- be summed up in a few words. Some liar to its own species, combined with the men had been working in a valiey coafine proportions of the horse, and sur- sisting of about twenty acres, when a
mounted by such a diadem of horns, that, quantity of bones, which turned out to like an oak twined in a rock, extend be the remains of the animal of which we their protecting branches on either side are speaking, was found on a bed of blne of its massy forehead to the distance of clay, covered by strata of peat and sheK nearly six feet !Would not such a living marl. Upon the representation of this wonder be better worth seeing than all circumstance to the Dublin Society, Mr. the snarling, hissing, " cribbed and HART was commissioned to proceed to cabined" in, raggamuffins of an African the place, in order to make a selection of er an Asiatic menagerie ? And there is the bones to complete a skeleton, which the chase of such an animal, pursued too he has done in a very workman-like manby Irish wolf-dogs in the glen of the ner. It is the only perfect one of the downs, suppose, with Mr. Crampton at kind we believe in existence. their head, (provided the two Dicks of Such are the facts of the discovery and Bow-street, Martin and Birnie, were not completion of this skeleton ; but curiosity at hand to interrupt the sport,) amid the ,is seldom content with meagre details,
127
uncertainty be an encouragement satisfactory? Valleys and mountains exto speculate, never was there a better changed places like the figurantes of an subject than the present for the exercise opera! What to-day was the habitable and if
or a finer opportunity to earth, the returning sun looked down at a trifling expense. It upon as the depths of the ocean ! One learned appear is indeed impossible to stand over the would think that by such a revolution pit from whence such a treasure is re- every vestige of terrestrial life would scued and not ask the question, how, or have been obliterated, and instead of when, it was deposited there? When a daily discovering their remains, the orivoice, as if from the tomb of all such ginal tenants of the first ocean should be remains, will answer, " go, read Cuvier." now exhumated by our excavations. In reviewing the labours of this philoWell, what then, suppose you do so, will you be a degree wiser than before? We sopher on this particular point, such perfear not; the speculations which such haps as no other man could have percuriosities excite are amongst the least formed ; in ascending the chain of his satisfactory in which the human mind can best constructed arguments, there is a indulge. Nothing, at least, can better vanity, a visionary halo, encompassing prove the uncertainty in which these sub- the airy fabric of deductions to which jects are involved than the contradictory they lead, on which no mind, untincwith enthusiasm, or the mania of theories promulged by each succeeding cGsmological architect. Though this idea world-making, can repose with confiof deducing geological inferences from the dence. Not a fact has he recorded that state and order in which fossil remains has not its fellow; not an argument are detected claims the gigantic genius of without its antagonist; not a note on his CUVIER for its parent, our objection will geological scale (which, like the lyre of hold valid, for it must be confessed, with Orpheus, would seem to possess soveregret, that his vast labours on this head reign power over the creation) that has have only terminated in plausible conjec- not its natural counterpoint. Instead, ture. Hear the great oracle himself:- then, of attempting to solve the great " With Dolomin I believe, that if there geological enigma by the light of CUVIER, is any circumstance thoroughly establish- or amusing our readers with a profound
of
ingenuity,
tnred
geology, it is that the surface of globe has been subjected to a great guess at the manner in which these aniand sudden revolution, the epoch ofmals have become the inmates of our bogs, which cannot be dated farther back than see what is or rather what let us known, five or six thousand years ago ; that this revolution had buried all the countries is unknown, about their remains. It is which were before inhabited by men and in vain we turn to Irish antiquarians, who by animals that are now best known; seem fertile on that the same revolution laid diy the every other subject in ed in our
bed of the lost ocean, which now forms proportion to its sterility. The regal all the countries at present inhabited ; that the small number of individuals of costume of the country they have demen and of animals that escaped from scribed to a nicety. The number of strings the effects of that great revolution have to the first Irish harp admits of no doubt. since propagated and spread over the that a race of milk-white horses peculiar lands thus newly laid dry." Giants are only to be stabbed in their to the island were paraded in purple and sleep—CUVIER is only assailable when silver reins, to swell the pomp of a papal he nods ; Qnandoque dormitat bonus pageant; that the Irish wolf dogs were Homerus." Is this summary of this in-exhibited to the astonished Romans at the comparable philosopher’s geological creedCercensian games ; that our goshawk-s
128 the pride of foreign princes ; period, they have been found in almost that bishops bandied presents of the river every county in the island, so that we 13aii pearls ; and that the choicest amber- may conclude that they must at some lae. gris once floated round the islands of riod have been the livingornaments of its Arran; all these, and many more won- fields. But whether they were the sole derful things, they- have told us, which proprietors of the soil, or shared its fer. gladden the heart of every Irishman, be- tility with contemporary men ; or whether .cause, having nothing to dwell on at they became extinct from human persewere once
pleasure cution, or the breath of an epidemic mur. giories of the rain, (questions which have been warmly
present but misery, he finds
a
the vague subject of the great deer past they are all silent. Even the inventive tongue of tradition is silent as to the epoch of the existence, as well as the catastrophe in which these animals were In the legends of the country too, many of which are of very ancient date, no mention whatever is made of these animals. It is certain, however, that their horns were presented to the two Charleses of England. In the history of Westmeath, written in 1682, by Sir John Piers, a native of that county, and in
contemplating but on the
destroyed.
preserved in the manuscript department library of Tiinity College, the following account of the transaction occurs : They were then (the horns) the wonder of those halcyon days, and the talk of not only those who had, as well as those of the
contested,)
we
must leave to the
sagacity
of Mr. Hart to determine.
Sure we are, that all such speculations will terminate in a coroner’s verdict, " Death by accidental drowning, or some other uncomOne thing only we can be mon cause." certain of, that such animals existed, from their visible remains : in all other re spects, we are circumstanced like the historians of Empedocles, who argued that the wayward youth found a grave in the bowels of rÆtna, from finding his brazen sandals on the verge of the mount. CAUTION
TO
PSALM SINGERS.
Dr. BLUNDELL, adver ting in his physioon Monday last, to the comparative anatomy of themaxi!!ary joint in 1)re(la(-eot:,,z, and herbivorous ant-t. logical lecture
mals, observed, in this respect, that man not, seen them; insomuch, that resembled the berbivorous class, but the report of them being carried to the there Mas a greater extent of’motion in the human jaw, and consequently of his was who had
Court lllajesty very a greater liahiiity to dislocation. The England, desirous to see them, and sent his coiii- learned Iccturer mentioned a curious case of this fact. A devout perr;,and in writing to Mr. Nugent, of Co- in illustration son, of the Wesleyan persuasion, lit’ting lamber, to bring them to him. Nugent up his voice in a hymn to its highest pitch, and went in person, and pre- brought the condyloid process to the very gleuoid cavity, and, them some time before the late edge ing a shake at this critical moment, acunhappy contest that arose between his tnally dislocated his jaw. We Imsten to and his Parliament; for which give puhlicity to this fact, that psaimsit1?:crs may not iu fntu)attempt to shake his Majesty rewarded him with a concorwith their condyloid processes at the batum of five hundred pounds." This is edge of their glenoid cavities. We may add too, that although psalm-singing is probably the first authentic or written unquestionably one of the purposes for tecord which notices these horns as a which jaws were given to man, yet their subject of public curiosity, a statement peculiar structure renders it doubtful whether the of natute would which we the more willingly publish, it not prefer a greatAutltor more moderate exercise of having escaped the scrutiny of those who this function, than devout vocalists are have written on the subject. Since that wont to indulge in.
obeyed,
oftlte
sented
Majesty
I
attempt.
sounding of bugles,
REVIEWS FROM THE WEST. Description of the Fossil Deer of Ireland, (cemus megaurus) in the Museum of the Royal Dublin Society." By JOHN HART, Surgeon. "
"Insulam
cervornm
venatu
insignem."—BEDE.
WE should be unworthy of the name cf Western Critics, did we not welcome this splendid ornament of our bogs from its lowly dwelling to its new habitation in the Museum of the Royal Dublin Society. It is, indeed, a magnificent skele.ton ; majestic even in ruin, and creditable to the land of its nativity; looking down seemingly with contempt on the petty curiosities, such as stuffed birds, bottled snakes, and Eastern idols,which make up a display around this august representative of an extinct race and the royalty of its species. What would not the spectator of so sublime a relic give to see it bound once more upon its native hills, clothed with flesh, and endued with its pristine vigour and beauty ? only imagine what a spectacle ! Six feet six inches in height, ten feet ten in length ; the loftiness of
"
A picture for painters to study, The fat was so white, the lean was su
ruddy." But the praises of such delicious food we must leave to some fitter minstrel. We shall, therefore, content onrselves with recording the little that is known of this ence beautiful animal, and the history of its resurrection, an account of which has been lately published in a tract by Mr. HART of Dublin ; but the importance of such an acquisition to organic remains should secure it a more diffused notoriety than the circulation of
such a work is calculated to afford. The particulars of the discovery may the cameleopard, the graceful agility pecu- be summed up in a few words. Some liar to its own species, combined with the men had been working in a valiey coafine proportions of the horse, and sur- sisting of about twenty acres, when a
mounted by such a diadem of horns, that, quantity of bones, which turned out to like an oak twined in a rock, extend be the remains of the animal of which we their protecting branches on either side are speaking, was found on a bed of blne of its massy forehead to the distance of clay, covered by strata of peat and sheK nearly six feet !Would not such a living marl. Upon the representation of this wonder be better worth seeing than all circumstance to the Dublin Society, Mr. the snarling, hissing, " cribbed and HART was commissioned to proceed to cabined" in, raggamuffins of an African the place, in order to make a selection of er an Asiatic menagerie ? And there is the bones to complete a skeleton, which the chase of such an animal, pursued too he has done in a very workman-like manby Irish wolf-dogs in the glen of the ner. It is the only perfect one of the downs, suppose, with Mr. Crampton at kind we believe in existence. their head, (provided the two Dicks of Such are the facts of the discovery and Bow-street, Martin and Birnie, were not completion of this skeleton ; but curiosity at hand to interrupt the sport,) amid the ,is seldom content with meagre details,
127
uncertainty be an encouragement satisfactory? Valleys and mountains exto speculate, never was there a better changed places like the figurantes of an subject than the present for the exercise opera! What to-day was the habitable and if
or a finer opportunity to earth, the returning sun looked down at a trifling expense. It upon as the depths of the ocean ! One learned appear is indeed impossible to stand over the would think that by such a revolution pit from whence such a treasure is re- every vestige of terrestrial life would scued and not ask the question, how, or have been obliterated, and instead of when, it was deposited there? When a daily discovering their remains, the orivoice, as if from the tomb of all such ginal tenants of the first ocean should be remains, will answer, " go, read Cuvier." now exhumated by our excavations. In reviewing the labours of this philoWell, what then, suppose you do so, will you be a degree wiser than before? We sopher on this particular point, such perfear not; the speculations which such haps as no other man could have percuriosities excite are amongst the least formed ; in ascending the chain of his satisfactory in which the human mind can best constructed arguments, there is a indulge. Nothing, at least, can better vanity, a visionary halo, encompassing prove the uncertainty in which these sub- the airy fabric of deductions to which jects are involved than the contradictory they lead, on which no mind, untincwith enthusiasm, or the mania of theories promulged by each succeeding cGsmological architect. Though this idea world-making, can repose with confiof deducing geological inferences from the dence. Not a fact has he recorded that state and order in which fossil remains has not its fellow; not an argument are detected claims the gigantic genius of without its antagonist; not a note on his CUVIER for its parent, our objection will geological scale (which, like the lyre of hold valid, for it must be confessed, with Orpheus, would seem to possess soveregret, that his vast labours on this head reign power over the creation) that has have only terminated in plausible conjec- not its natural counterpoint. Instead, ture. Hear the great oracle himself:- then, of attempting to solve the great " With Dolomin I believe, that if there geological enigma by the light of CUVIER, is any circumstance thoroughly establish- or amusing our readers with a profound
of
ingenuity,
tnred
geology, it is that the surface of globe has been subjected to a great guess at the manner in which these aniand sudden revolution, the epoch ofmals have become the inmates of our bogs, which cannot be dated farther back than see what is or rather what let us known, five or six thousand years ago ; that this revolution had buried all the countries is unknown, about their remains. It is which were before inhabited by men and in vain we turn to Irish antiquarians, who by animals that are now best known; seem fertile on that the same revolution laid diy the every other subject in ed in our
bed of the lost ocean, which now forms proportion to its sterility. The regal all the countries at present inhabited ; that the small number of individuals of costume of the country they have demen and of animals that escaped from scribed to a nicety. The number of strings the effects of that great revolution have to the first Irish harp admits of no doubt. since propagated and spread over the that a race of milk-white horses peculiar lands thus newly laid dry." Giants are only to be stabbed in their to the island were paraded in purple and sleep—CUVIER is only assailable when silver reins, to swell the pomp of a papal he nods ; Qnandoque dormitat bonus pageant; that the Irish wolf dogs were Homerus." Is this summary of this in-exhibited to the astonished Romans at the comparable philosopher’s geological creedCercensian games ; that our goshawk-s
128 the pride of foreign princes ; period, they have been found in almost that bishops bandied presents of the river every county in the island, so that we 13aii pearls ; and that the choicest amber- may conclude that they must at some lae. gris once floated round the islands of riod have been the livingornaments of its Arran; all these, and many more won- fields. But whether they were the sole derful things, they- have told us, which proprietors of the soil, or shared its fer. gladden the heart of every Irishman, be- tility with contemporary men ; or whether .cause, having nothing to dwell on at they became extinct from human persewere once
pleasure cution, or the breath of an epidemic mur. giories of the rain, (questions which have been warmly
present but misery, he finds
a
the vague subject of the great deer past they are all silent. Even the inventive tongue of tradition is silent as to the epoch of the existence, as well as the catastrophe in which these animals were In the legends of the country too, many of which are of very ancient date, no mention whatever is made of these animals. It is certain, however, that their horns were presented to the two Charleses of England. In the history of Westmeath, written in 1682, by Sir John Piers, a native of that county, and in
contemplating but on the
destroyed.
preserved in the manuscript department library of Tiinity College, the following account of the transaction occurs : They were then (the horns) the wonder of those halcyon days, and the talk of not only those who had, as well as those of the
contested,)
we
must leave to the
sagacity
of Mr. Hart to determine.
Sure we are, that all such speculations will terminate in a coroner’s verdict, " Death by accidental drowning, or some other uncomOne thing only we can be mon cause." certain of, that such animals existed, from their visible remains : in all other re spects, we are circumstanced like the historians of Empedocles, who argued that the wayward youth found a grave in the bowels of rÆtna, from finding his brazen sandals on the verge of the mount. CAUTION
TO
PSALM SINGERS.
Dr. BLUNDELL, adver ting in his physioon Monday last, to the comparative anatomy of themaxi!!ary joint in 1)re(la(-eot:,,z, and herbivorous ant-t. logical lecture
mals, observed, in this respect, that man not, seen them; insomuch, that resembled the berbivorous class, but the report of them being carried to the there Mas a greater extent of’motion in the human jaw, and consequently of his was who had
Court lllajesty very a greater liahiiity to dislocation. The England, desirous to see them, and sent his coiii- learned Iccturer mentioned a curious case of this fact. A devout perr;,and in writing to Mr. Nugent, of Co- in illustration son, of the Wesleyan persuasion, lit’ting lamber, to bring them to him. Nugent up his voice in a hymn to its highest pitch, and went in person, and pre- brought the condyloid process to the very gleuoid cavity, and, them some time before the late edge ing a shake at this critical moment, acunhappy contest that arose between his tnally dislocated his jaw. We Imsten to and his Parliament; for which give puhlicity to this fact, that psaimsit1?:crs may not iu fntu)attempt to shake his Majesty rewarded him with a concorwith their condyloid processes at the batum of five hundred pounds." This is edge of their glenoid cavities. We may add too, that although psalm-singing is probably the first authentic or written unquestionably one of the purposes for tecord which notices these horns as a which jaws were given to man, yet their subject of public curiosity, a statement peculiar structure renders it doubtful whether the of natute would which we the more willingly publish, it not prefer a greatAutltor more moderate exercise of having escaped the scrutiny of those who this function, than devout vocalists are have written on the subject. Since that wont to indulge in.
obeyed,
oftlte
sented
Majesty
I
attempt.