In Shakespeare
they are shadowy and broken; in Wordsworth they relentlessly improve
the occasion. What one desires to see depicted is some figure that has
gained in gentleness and tolerance without losing, shrewdness and
perception; who is as much interested as ever in seeing the game
played, without being enviously desirous to take a hand. The thing is
so perfectly beautiful when it occurs in real life that it is hard to
see why it should not be represented.
XLV
I seem to remember having lately seen at the Zoo a strange and
melancholy fowl, of a tortoise-shell complexion, glaring sullenly from
a cage, with that curious look of age and toothlessness that eagles
have, from the overlapping of the upper mandible of the beak above the
lower; it was labelled the _Monkey-eating Eagle_. Its food lay untasted
on the floor; it much preferred, no doubt, and from no fault of its
own, poor thing, a nice, plump, squalling baboon to the finest of chops
without the fun!
But the name set me thinking, and brought to mind a very different kind
of creature, from whom I have suffered much of late, the _Eagle-eating
Monkey_ by which I mean the writer of bad books about great people. I
had personally always supposed that I would rather read even a poor
book about a real human being than the cleverest of books about
imaginary people; at least I thought so till I was obliged to read a
large number of memoirs and biographies, written some by stupid
painstaking people, and some by clever aggravating people, about a
number of celebrated persons.
Pages:
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294