A DOG AND MONKEY FIGHT.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 129, 29 October 1874, Page 3

A DOG AND MONKEY FIGHT.

The following narrative of an encounter between a monkey and a dog is taken from a work entitled, “Life in London,” written in 1821 by Pierce Egan. The scene is laid in the parlour of Tom Cribb, the then champion of England, where a card bearing the following notice is being distributed to the assembled company : “An Italian Turn Up. —Surprising Novelty in the Sporting Circle.—On Tuesday next, the 7th of September, in the evening, a special grand combat will be decided in the Westminster Pit between that extraordinary and celebrated creature the famed Italian monkey, ‘ Jacco Maccacco,’ of Hoxton, third cousin to the renowned ‘ Theodore Maccacco,’.'of unrivalled fame, and a dog twenty pounds weight, the property of a nobleman well known in the circle. N.B. The owner of the monkey, having purchased him at considerable expense on account of his wonderful

talents, begs to notice to his friends of the fancy that another person has started a match with a common monkey on the day preceding this match, with an intent to injure him and deceive the public.” Shortly before the hour a move was made for Westminister. On arrival at the door of the pit they found a motley group assembled, consisting of sweeps, swells, barristers, donkey boys, honorables, sprigs of nobility, M.P.’s, &c.—all in one rude contact jostling with each other for a front look at the show. The dog pit was filled in a few minutes, and numerous persons went away grumbling — as if they had lost the finest sight in the world—at not being able to get an entrance to the pit. Some little delay having arisen, a costermonger roared out, “ I say, guv’nor, how long have we to be kept in this rookery before you give us a sight of the phenonimy?” Jacco Maccacco was at length produced in a handsome little wooden house amid the shouts and loud whistling of the audience. But he was not polite enough to bow in return for this mark of approbation paid to him. Jacco had a small chain of about two yards in length placed around his loins, which was fastened to a strong iron stake driven a considerable length in the ground. The dog was immediately brought in and let fly at him; but the monkey, previous to the attack, gathered himself up with as much cunning as a prizefighter would do, in order to repel the shock. The dog immediately got him down and turned him up ; but the monkey, in an instant, with his teeth, which met like a saw, made a large wound in the throat of the dog as if done by a knife, and the dog soon afterwards expired. The monkey seldom met with any injury in these combats. ‘ What a deep covey,’ said a gieasy butcher, with his mouth open, a red nightcap on his head, and pointing toward Jacco Maccacco ; ‘ blow me if ever I saw such a thing in my life before ? Why, he seems to mill the dog with as much ease and sagacity as if he’d been fighting matches with them for years,’ A small volume might be filled with the singular remarks and gestures made by the noisy, motley group on the finishing qualities possessed by Jacco Maccacco. Some laughed, others shouted vehemently, and numbers were continually jumping up and down in a sort of ecstasy, and knocking their sticks on the ground not unlike the inmates of a lunatic asylum when free from their strait waistcoats. The match being over, some clean water was thrown over the monkey to refresh him, when he appeared little the worse for his encounter, and was immediately put into his wooden house.