See what your forefathers could accomplish by means the
simplest.--_Risum teneatis?_
* * * * *
There are many stories told of the craft of the fox to compass his prey, of
which Ol. Magnus hath many: such as feigning the bark of a dog to catch
prey near the houses; feigning himself dead to catch such animals as come
to feed upon him; laying his tail upon a wasp's nest and then rubbing it
hard against a tree, thus catching the wasps so killed; ridding himself of
fleas by gradually going into the water with a lock of wool in his mouth,
and so driving the fleas up into it and then leaving it in the water; by
catching crab fish with his tail, which he saith he himself was a witness
of.--_Derham's Physico-Theology_, book iv. chap. 11., and _Ol. Mag. Hist._
lib. xviii. cap. 39, 40.--Peruse this ye incredulous lectors of Baron
Munch-Hausen, and Colonel Nimrod. Talk no more of the fertile genius of our
Yankee brethren, but candidly admit ye are blameworthy for withholding
credence to matters which rather border on the marvellous.
* * * * *
Had man been a dwarf he could not have been a rational creature; for he
must then have had a jolt head, so there would not have been body and blood
enough to supply his brain with spirits, or he must have had a small head
answerable to his body, and so there would not have been brain enough for
his business.
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