The Chronicle. PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25. THE MARK OF THE BEAST.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 25 September 1912, Page 2

The Chronicle. PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25. THE MARK OF THE BEAST.

It is a relief to drop polities at times, and to shut the mind against social problems and local questions; to be inconsequential, in short, and buoyantly irresponsible. Wherefore, to-day, The Chronicle has no remarks to make on any matters of importance; it is concerned only to give approval to the whimsically conceived dissertation of an Ota go writer, Mr T. Hutton, on "The Mark of the Beast." This is an original essay 011 a subject that does not matter, and it appeared originally in the Oamaru Mail. The quizzical essayist says:—What possessed the child to think of monkeys. Every little girl knows that monkeys do not grow in Now Zealand, and the young idea should learn to patronise local industries.

With pencil and paper I have acted the heavy father with average success. Amusement had been combined with instruction —of a sort. The side section of a. big pig with curly tail had been limned amid shrieks of (approbation ; the conventional elephant had 'been ponderously outlined and passed for payment; the set-square house lacking in perspective has evoked desires to live there for ever and ever : and the impossible trees surrounding had boe.n well and truly planted. 1 had. by request, drawn men and women, dogs, cats, rabbits, and nailwav trains.

"And now," she said, "will von please draw me a monkey." A monkey! Have I not .scon him nirainst the Indian diawn a. liillotvinci gibbering torrent of tails and hair and sinful activity pouring ialong the rocking jungle troo-to]>s for mile on mile. Or, again, skipping and grimacing in the odour of sanctity on the moss-grown temple roofs. Did T not know him in zoos, a futile, wizened crrature, [flickered and bizarre, industriously specialising it flc as. Had not a nvonkey, of which T was the unhappy owner, escaped into the mess of one of the "best" regiments, sampled the decanters and 'become drunken, and outpoured the vintages promiscuously as a. libation to some Bhanda-log Bacchus before leaping for the rafters to shed a perfect snowstorm of Argyroplos best Egyptian cigarettes rent and imperfectly chewed. Draw a monkey? Why, of course. A- few pencil strokes, and f was not quite sure. The monkey, after all, is an elusive element. As far as artistry is concerned, there is little to ky hold of except its tail, and what is a tail without a monkey? On reflection T found the only abiding im- ' pression left with me. bv monkevdom was of perpetual .motion—not an easy element to draw; and the monkey, however vivid he may be in the abstract, hardly lends himself to individuml treatment. Coming to think of it, I had only seen one monkey that kept perfectly still. • That one was dead. Coining to Calcutta to cold latitudes the smilormon had thoughtfully made a ml flannel jacket and a. pair of blue knickerbockers with a hole for the tail to come through. And all . would have been well had lie gone to bed with his master instead of getting himself shut up in the hen-coop. For ithere we found him next morning frozen stiff in his little red coat and blue bloomers, quizzical of countenance, a dreadful little travesty of death. j T spoiled much paper. I invented a number of quite new animals. I drew tilings undreamed of in heaven and earth. I evolved apparitions that alarmed me. But not one bore the faintest Tesemblance to* monkeys. Straw-clutching I remembered that long ago they were out coiisiiis or something, and I endeav-

ourod to instil a human foundation into my creations; and the result was likonesses of some of my dearest friends, naked with claws and 0 tail. "That's Daddy," exclaimed the child with conviction, "but what a big walking stick he's got." It was not a walking stick, but a hind leg; but I foi'bore the correction and looked despairingly into the lire, feeling an imposter. . The fire? No lack of monkeys there. Big monkeys, small monkeys, pink monkeys, yellow monkeys, and redhot monkeys that sizzled and flung sparks at each other. They vanished leaving fl- big black balwon which sat in corner and glowered. The brute was in a. tree, T noticed, and dropped to earth, standing erect and burly to light, tearing lumps off its antagonist with its dreadful hands. Then tiring of trees it found a narrow-mouthed cave. Hither it was located by a sabretooth tiger, which snarlinglv intruded an incautious head ; and the Brute brained it wickedly with a. holder. The Brute drew my sympathies, and as my heart went out to it the creature humanised before my eyes. And T shuddered at the things it did; its greed, its murders, its primitive, love affairs, its horrible reasoned savagery, its tempestuous ordeal of survival. A cinder fell acridly in the hearth, and there was a. rustle of dry bones and dead memories. The Brute had gone, but something warned me of worse to follow. Something nearer and terribly akin, some shocking-blood tie. some crooked link; the missing link with all its time-euohled heirs. "Even now 1 could hear it scrabbling in the chimney, that old black sheep oi the human family coming to cover me in atavistic shame. I could vision the bloated distortations, the bestial shape, the lean, spidery arms and thumbed feet, the red-rimmed eye, and all. Tt was coming, and I. in my dismay, was motionless. There was a struggle, a clatter, a. spring. Tt leapt heavily upon my knees, and said softly, "Why, T do declare you've been asleep." T looked through beads of icy sweat, to see the golden curls, the laughing face, the cleanness, the gentle purity, and . all the summer sunshine of happy childhood. Jf.'s <m. " y.lip said. And 1 replied. "Thank God."