" The only muss now common to them is the _mus_ tribe,
comprising the _mus ratus_, or ordinary rat (so called from its haunting
ordinaries, we suppose), and the timid mouse, with which the Bird of
Wisdom is contented to put up when the sparrows decline to come to his
claw.
Central Park offers numerous attractions now to all who love to keep up
their animal spirits by studying animal life. There is a fat little
Asiatic pig there, who is the very picture of content. A red pig he is,
and exceedingly well behaved. The best red pig, in fact, that we
remember ever to have seen, beating the learned pig by several trumps
and an ace. When we last saw him he was very busy with his pen, and our
surmise was that his mind was fully occupied with arrangements for
editing the works of BACON, or, possibly, those of HOGG.
The young elephant has increased immensely, since last year, in stature
and girth. He is remarkably neat in his person, wisping himself all over
with hay for hours at a time. Whether he does this for cleanliness or to
obtain a flavor of elephant for the hay is doubtful, however, for he
always eats it after having made use of it as a flesh-brush for a good
while. Notices requesting visitors "not to feed or annoy the animals"
are posted on the compartments. In the case of the elephant, though, it
might be as well also to caution persons against making jokes about his
trunk--a low kind of ribaldry in which every carpet-bagger, who never
had one, seems to think himself bound to indulge.
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