ANIMAL LOVE OF MUSIC.

Maddened with the thirst for vengeance, I the sublimest strains of the human voice or cun-
bounded toward him, with the intention of kill-ningly-played instrument as any post can pos-

ing him, but I was surrounded and pinioned, sibly be, and prefers the untuneful scream of
and I heard, as in a dream, the reproaches and the cat's-meat man to the noblest compositions
of Beethoven. Still, as if Nature was determ-
condemnations of my brother-officers.
"I have little to add," continued the monk.ined to assert the triumph of harmony over
"You know how they punish dueling in this every living thing, now and then a cat turns up
I was deprived of my commission, who has a genuine musical ear, and will man-
country.
We once
and sent as a private soldier to the Caucasus. ifest unequivocal satisfaction and delight at
But this punishment was light, for the true tor-harmonious combinations of sound.
ture lay in my own heart. For me life was owned a cat who would listen complacently to
ended, and I longed for some friendly bullet to music by the hour together, always accompany-
put me out of pain. But I had not the happi-ing it with a gentle purring-who would leave
ness to fall in battle, and this retreat alone was her hunting-ground in garden or cellar when-
left me. I am unknown to all; and seek to ever music was going on in parlor or drawing-
stifle with penitential prayers the voice that room-who would scratch at the door, and croon
But I have not yet found and mew to be let in, and would resent a pro-
rings in my heart.
peace. Every night terrible dreams come to longed exclusion by certain expressive displays
me. I see Vetcheslaff covered with blood, my of disapprobation. When admitted, she would
mother dying of despair, and I hear continually leap on the piano, and attempt, after the New
those awful words, 'Cain, what hast thou done Zealand fashion of expressing regard, to rub
noses with the performer.
with thy brother ?' "

THE

ANIMAL LOVE OF MUSIC.

HE sensibility of animals to music will hardly be questioned in the present day, when the manners and habits of all animated nature are We no so thoroughly observed and studied. longer doubt the dictum of the poet, who sings, "Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast;" and therefore, it is not so much in corroboration of his assertion, as in illustration of a fact so interesting and pleasing in itself, that we are about to bring to the notice of the reader some few instances of animal love of music which are too well authenticated to admit of a doubt, and some of which are the records of our personal observation and experience.

One of the German biographers of Mozart makes mention of a tame pigeon, which was the companion and pet of that extraordinary genius when a child. The bird, when at liberty, would never leave the side of the young composer while he was playing any instrument, and had to be caught and confined in his cage to prevent him from following his little favorite from room to

room.

Whenever the boy came into the presence of the pigeon the latter manifested the utmost uneasiness until he began to play; if the door of the cage were opened, the bird would fly to the violin and peck at the strings, or to the harpsichord and jump and flutter on the keys, and would not be pacified until the child sat down to play, when it would perch quietly on his shoulder, and sit there for hours almost without moving a feather.

Cats have a species of undelightful music of their own, performed, as we all know, at unseasonable hours on the leads, house-tiles, and garden walls of our dwellings. Puss's performances are generally too chromatic for ears not feline, and we humans are given to disconcert their concertos with a shower from the waterjug, or any thing else that comes to hand, when their untimely carols rouse us from our sleep. In revenge, Puss is generally as indifferent to

He

Here

An old friend of ours reports another instance, which is perhaps still more remarkable. was in the habit, most evenings in the week, of spending an hour or two at the piano after the studious labors of the day. His pet cat, though as a kitten indifferent to music, grew to like it, and regularly led the way to the piano when the business of the tea-table was done. she took post on a chair, and listened gravely during the whole performance. When it ceased, and the instrument was closed, she would return to the rug, or to his knee, and sleep out the rest of the evening. Not so, however, if the piano was left open; in that case Puss leaped on the keys and pawed a performance of her own, in which she showed an extreme partiality for the treble notes, and something like alarm at the big bass ones, when she happened to give them an extra vigorous kick with her heels. In fact, a rousing discord would frighten her off the keys, but she would return again and soothe her feelings by a gentle pattering among the upper notes. These exploits she repeated whenever the piano was left open, and whether she had auditors or not; so that it became necessary to close the instrument or exclude the cat from the room in order to insure a moment's quietness. If by any chance her master spent the evening from home, Puss showed her disappointment and dissatisfaction by restlessness and ill-temper.

Twenty-five years ago the writer was one of a joint-stock proprietary who owned a boat on an inland river, winding through a retired and picturesque tract of country. There were seven of us, all being either singers or players of instruments; and in this boat it was our custom to spend an occasional leisure hour in musical voyagings up and down the river. To many an old English melody on these occasions did the moss-covered rocks and precipitous banks return harmonious echoes. We made strange acquaintances on those long voyages, up a stream navigated by no other keel than ours;

the violin, we reached down the basket and found him gone. Whether he had fallen out by accident while hanging by his tail, or taken the leap on purpose, there was no knowing; but he had disappeared, and we saw him no more, though a few weeks after his departure we found his skin, turned inside out, behind a

and, among other natural curiosities, we fell in | cover when it had ceased. One day, on findwith a musical cow. This creature, a small ing that he made no appearance at the call of cream-colored specimen of the Alderney breed, suckled her calf, along with a dozen other vaccine mothers, in a meadow which sloped down to the river's brink. Whenever we turned the bend of the river, "with our voices in tune as the oars kept time," and the meadow came in sight, there we were sure to see the white cow, standing up to the shoulders in the water, whith-box placed against the wall. er she had advanced to meet us, her neck stretched out and her dripping nose turned toward the boat. As we skirted the meadow she kept pace with us on the bank, testifying her delight by antics of which no cow in her senses would have been thought capable. She would leap, skip, roll on her back, rear on her hind legs, then hurl them aloft in the air like a kicking horse-now rushing into the water to look at us nearer, now frisking off like a kitten at play. When she came to the meadow-fence, she dashed through it furiously into the next field, and so on through the next fence, and the next after that. The fourth being railed, she would turn it by wading the river, and was only prevented from following us further by a steep, precipitous bank which stopped her progress. After these mad gambols she always returned to her calf, first saluting us with a long plaintive kind of bellow, by way of farewell.

Dogs, judging from the conduct of the generality of them, may be regarded as indifferent to music, as they are noticed neither to seek nor shun it, as a general rule. Being remarkably docile, however, they may be, and are, taught to discriminate tunes, and to dance to violin, pipe, and drum in a manner that indicates plainly enough their appreciation of musical time at least. Some dogs grind organs at the command of their unfeeling exhibitors; and though they always set about the business with a serious face, that may be no proof that they dislike music. Our own dog-a cross between a Scotch and a Skye terrier-is affected in an extraordinary way by the notes of the harmonium, and chooses to post himself close to the instrument while it is playing. So long as the music runs below a certain pitch all is well; but touch a single note above that, and he prepares to join in the performance himself. If a shrill note is prolonged above a minim he points his nose in the air, at an angle of about

straight line from the nostrils to the tail, pitches precisely the same note, which he will go on sounding as long as you please. The inference generally drawn is, that he dislikes it, and that the notes to which he thus responds are painful to him. To us that is not so clear, since, though the door be open, and he has the run of the whole house, he never shows the least disposition to make his escape. Who shall say that it is not a luxury to him? The point is doubtful, at least; and we shall give him the benefit of the doubt, and acquit him of the charge, which we deem odious, of disrelishing music.

At this period it was that, rescuing a fine snake from some ignorant boys who were about to kill it, under the notion that it was venom-forty degrees, and, elongating his body in a ous, but who were glad to sell it for twopence, we carried the slippery creature home, and assigned him a lodging in a small wicker basket, filled with moss, and suspended by a single string from a hook in the ceiling of our bachelor's snuggery. The reptile grew to know us, and to welcome us in his way, by gliding his cold coil across our face and temples when we brought him fresh moss, or tempted him with food, which, by-the-way, he would never take. It was by accident only that we discovered his musical predilections. One evening, while marching the room to the sound of our old violin, with which it was our custom to beguile an occasional hour, we caught sight of what seemed We shall close the present sketch by a rea monstrous python threatening us from aloft. markable instance of the love of music exemIt was the shadow of our pet snake, projected plified in the conduct of a party of mice, who by the single candle on the table to the arched had obtained surreptitious admission at a pubceiling above, and magnified to formidable-look-lic concert. Thus it runs: "Soon after Miss ing dimensions. The fellow was hanging out Hay had commenced her first song, the party of the basket almost by the tip of his tail, and, occupying the front seats saw a mouse saunterwith his head stretched toward us, was following leisurely up and down, close to the skirting ing our motions as we walked up and down the room. We remembered the snake-charmers, and conceived at once that it was the music which had brought him out; and so it proved, as we had opportunity of certifying by repeated experiments. Whenever he heard the violin he came out, and always with his head in the direction of the sound, as if anxious to reach it. When taken from the basket and hung round the neck, he lay limp and as if lifeless while the music lasted, and did not immediately re

of the platform on which she was singing. As the song proceeded the mouse stood spellbound. A lady tried to drive it away, by shaking her concert-bill at it; but the little animal had lost its fear of man, and would not retire. At the conclusion of the piece the mouse vanished, but reappeared, bringing with it a companion when the next song commenced. At the end of song the second the two mice retreated to their hole, but made their third appearance on the boards when the singing was again re

"Isn't it? I had to disappoint Clara Jones for that very reason! There's your own dress in the first place-it wasn't so bad when the bride gave the dresses, for then you had only to give her the same back in a present, but now there's your dress-and the party."

newed. Eventually, six or seven mice came to be an awfully expensive business, my dear out regularly with every song, and retired when child!" the music ceased. While the melodious tones filled the apartment all attempts to drive away the mice were vain. These most timid members of the animal kingdom were too fascinated to be in terror of the human family, who actually filled the room; and though a fiftieth part of the means used to drive them away would, under ordinary circumstances, have sufficed, they now stood, or slowly glided, so entranced by the melody which pervaded the room that they were heedless of the presence of their natural enemies. How naturalists may explain this phenomenon we know not, nor shall we swell this article by attempting a solution." The paragraph concluded by giving the names of several respectable individuals who witnessed the singular phenomenon, and who were willing to testify to the truth of the report.

POMPS AND VANITIES.

"Even as some sick men will take no medicine unless some pleasant thing be put amongst their potions, although it be somewhat hurtful, yet the physician suffereth them to have it: so because many will not hearken to serious and grave doctriments, unless they be mingled with some fable or jest, therefore reason willeth us to do the like."-SIE. THOMAS MOORE.

"Yes, if it's only a sociable, you have to give something in the way of a party, and our rooms being so large, I had seven invitations to stand this winter. I hardly knew Adeline Crossman; such a set as I got into by it, oh mi!"

"There! I said to mamma-didn't I, mamma?—that I wondered you could mix yourself up with such very common people. But Serena Hopkins and I went to Madame Chegary's together, and we have always been excessively intimate. What do you mean to give her?" "Dear knows! this is the first I have heard of it."

"Oh dear! Why I knew it ages ago-six weeks at least-and it's well I did, for I shall have to embroider her something myself; the materials are all I can afford. Papa groans awfully this year over our bills, doesn't he mamma? He feels as poor as possible."

Lest our rural friends, to whom poverty has

SCARCELY had the friends of the late Miss usually a painful significance, should waste too Hopkins ceased congratulating themselves much sympathy on the young lady making such on having met the expense of the costly bridal an honest confession of it, we might as well presents she had received from them, when it state that both her mother and herself wore began to be privately circulated among the fe- costly robes de chambre; "mamma" differing male portion that any thing in the way of a so slightly in the style of her toilet that she christening gift would be acceptable. Indeed, might easily have passed for the elder sister of it was scarcely put in that form; the suggestion the two girls who were lolling in damask-covamounted to an expectation, a demand of trib-ered easy chairs on either side of the cheerute to the coming son and heir of Marcus ful fire. The glowing grate was made grateful Lane, who had been so fortunate as to win the by a blustering March wind that whirled dust belle of her set, née Hopkins. Those who had and ashes past the heavily draped windows. contributed to the elegantly-laid table in the The morning room was perfect in its appointbride's dressing-room would now have an op-ments-low couches instead of sofas; sewingportunity to help fill her bureau-drawers with chairs which had no claim to their title, inasthose delicate articles of lace, embroidery, cash- much as they were usually occupied by morning mere, flannel, silver, and trinkets generally, visitors who rarely set a stitch; book-cases of which are by no means less expensive than the carved rosewood, well filled with the light littrousseau, and are quite as publicly paraded at erature of the day in resplendent bindings; an the proper season. Those who had declined, or oval table to correspond, on which stood the inadvertently neglected to pay tribute on that most fanciful of work-baskets fluttering with occasion, had a chance to redeem their stand-ribbons, and lightly filled with the delicate ing, while sharp eyes and long memories would keep the reckoning.

"I'm glad I made out to give Serena that handsome cake-knife," said Ellen Lawton, who had been first bridesmaid. "There won't be so much expected of me now. I have but just saved it out of my allowance."

handiwork in which both mother and daughter took great pride, and which earned them the distinction of being considered miracles of industry by their idle acquaintances.

Poverty of feeling in rural districts is usually exhibited in a show of retrenchment, but in Clinton Place the seamstress up stairs, in some unknown corner of the domestic world, still set the careful stitches in wristbands and collars of the shirts which the distressed head of the family was to wear, and which his expensive sons ornamented with studs of opal or pearl, and even in the case of the eldest, who was supposed to be in business for himself, diamonds.

"Have you? why, how economical you must be!" Bridesmaid number two, Miss Harris, of Madison Square, elevated her delicately-arched eyebrows and daintily-gloved hands at the same moment. "Why, I went right to Pa for the money for that card-basket-it was eighteen dollars at Tiffany's. But he vowed it was the last time I should be bridesmaid this The ladies of the family had no time for year. I don't blame him, though-it's getting | plain sewing, no time for waiting on themselves

or the gentlemen who made their appearance at | Madame Chegary, who scarcely noticed her enthe six o'clock dinner. When caps, chemisettes, trance by a salutation. Mrs. Lawton had just under-sleeves, and petticoats were to be embroidered, all minor considerations must give way. "I can't conceive how you find time to do so much;" and Miss Harris-only daughter of Elihu Harris, Esq., the well-known ship-chandler down town, and the owner of a free-stone front in a new block of the new square, when at home, and divested of all commercial adjuncts -shrugged her shoulders in commiseration of the harassed and laborious life her friend must lead, doing so many yards of broiderie Anglais, and filling up so many square inches of canvas with the most recent patterns in Berlin wool.

taught the absolute necessity of loading brides | expeditions among their cases and counters, with every manner of uselessness the last time charmed with an excuse to revel in the sight I was here. Suppose you proceed with my education, as I was brought up in the woods.' You need not look distressed, Ellen. My feelings are never injured by the literal truth. Your father and I were the children of a plain farmer, and Greene County is still one of the 'dark places.""