Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-02-14 00:00:00

TI IE NORTHERN TIMES, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1859

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TAIMSETSS.
-4n • your . Saturday's paper, there is an
meow tof an accident at the Menagerie. From
this, it appears, •that on. Thursday evening,. two
men, tb e worse of drink, entered-Menders' .Mena-
gerie ; a nd, as might have been expected —suclimen
such company—one of the- drunken beasts was-
Considei ably damaged' by' owe of the tigers, likely
a ,Royal I one, as no doubt his dignity would be
insulted by the irritation he received, and more so
.by a hnt nan beast, or worse than a beast, as every
drunken man is,. and much, it is to be regretted.
there, are in this town so many-animals of this -sort..
The part tgraph goes on to state, "but the faults•
are all h; is own ;" and again, "-the entire blame is
attribute;ble to himself, no matter what the-results
may be." No doubt,, directly, the poor an& unfor-
tunate man was solely to blame- and many unre-
fleeting and unfeeling people trill at once.say, it
serves him right. Perhaps it may do so, and- more
so, if he recovers,. and becomes, as I hope he may,
a sober man. The, lesson may be a good one,
though such an experimental lesson is a= very
dangerous one, and such as no one should. try, or
be allowed to try, Rarey's law of kinilnps,s will
do more in taming wild savage and drunken
natures, than allowing them to approach wild
beasts. " A righteous man. regardetb. the- life of
his beast," though much more the life of his
fellow-man, even though he should:. place himself,
by his folly, below the level of a beast. Prevention
being better than cure, we should first make a
strong effort to prevent drunkenness., Failing
this, try as far as possible to reclaim the arunkard
but as at present we cannot, unfortunately,.
accomplish effectually so desirable an cud, as some
thirsty souls in spite of every effort will get
drunk, we are certainly bound., by every law-
human and divine, to care for the life of our
fellow men, and none • more so than a •drunken,
man, for none require it more, for then his reason
is gone, and he is nothing' more nor less than a
madman ; and being so, I do think such men
should not be allowed' to enter a' menagerie,
anymore than a railway carriage, in bath
places they are an intolerable nuisance to every
one who has the misfortune to be near them, and
their lives are in great danger ; therefore, I say,
though not directly to blame, the proprietors of
menageries • are indirectly and morally culpable
when they allow, such people to enter —and though,
in this instance,, cautioned by the keeper when
there, still the keeper would only have done his
duty, had lie at first turned the men out, and,
returned them their money. No doubt had he
done 30, the poor injured fellow, when his reason
returned, and if he had. any recollection left of,
what had happened, or' a spark of gratitude in
him, would ever have looked on the keeper or
whoever turned him out, as his kindest friend and
benefactor. C.

THE CARDINAL'S VISIT AND THE REV.
• MR. ROBINSON.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE NORTHERN TIMES.
should.have replied to Mr. Robinson's
letter, which appeared in your Tuesday's paper,
before this, but that I intended accepting his kind
invitation to attend at the Concert all this
evening, and, " being one of themselves," might
have presumed to conront the Rev.. Mr. Robinson,
withhecoming respect ; but, on consulting a shrewd
Catholic friend of mine, and soliciting the favour
of his company on the occasion, he began.huraming
" Step into my parlour, said the• spider to the fly.
Upon my queStioning him for an exPlanation, he
shrewdly observed, " Don't go, unfeSs you have
grown stiff and green-mouldy for
.want of a beat-
ing ; 'unless you covet-the risk of being called upon
to exercise your ; pugilistic abilities'—which I, for
one, am neither disposed to-underrate nor despise.
Don't go, my dear - friend ; for the hint might be
given to the auditory that if you never vanished
before, they might try the experiment of making
you .fly before them ; or, as that might not look .
quite respectable, or consistent with a reformation
ga(lering, they. could conceal themselves' in secret
ambush, and pelt you with stones 'or mud, .a la
Cardinal.' " •
Well, sir, acting upon the presumption that
discretion is the •better.part of valour, I now find
myself seated before a cheerful fire, after a hard •
day's work, instead of, like Ajax, defying the
lightning at .the Concert Hall ; and having an
odd sheet of paper " dust gathering " in my desk,
I think it only right and cautious on my part to
"turn to" and reply to the letter of Mr. Robin-
son, Incumbent of Saint Bartholoniew's Church.
Now, if Mr. Robinson will deign to accept a hint
from a discriminating friend, he will in all future
correspondence dispense with that superfluous
appendage to his reverend name,- for 'it smells of
rank Popery," Mid a person contemplating the
Saint's life and times is carried back to the "dark
ages" when the sun failed to shine, and people
had then as now, to put up with a 'geed deal of
" moonshine." .
Why does not his party call their church after
some of the Protestant Saints,—such as " St.
Harry the VIII; St. _Luther; St. Calvin, or St.
Wickliffe ;" and not after such benighted Papist
Saints, as St. Augustine, St. Bartholoniew, St.
- •Chrysostom, or St. •Clernert ? 'lt's a wonder it
does not excite the blush of shame in practising
such rank inconsistency, and alluring innocent
people into your houses under such false titles
and pretences. Nov here, is a wide and ready
field for the stringent application of the. " Eccle-
' siastical Titles Bill." However, I suppose my
Catholic fellow-countrymen tolerate such liberties
being taken with their saints' names,,in hopes that,.
when those noble and substantial ' edifices are
handed over to them on some future day, they
will not be put to the expense and trouble of a
" second christeninn.." If Macaulay's "New Zea-
lander" was to anticipate the time he is .expected
to be sketching the ruins of St. Paul's from a
broken arch of London Bridge, and just now drop
in upon us, and, going his rounds, ask the
bystanders, " Who was St. Bartholomew, whose
name I see inscribed over the doorway, that you
honour his name and memory by calling this
church after him ?" why would they not have to
confess that he was no :Protestant, but a poor,
_

unfortunate Papist. Might not then Mr. New
Zealander, looking at the inscription, reproach
them for " illegal possession," and bid them
" render to ausar the things that are Ccesar's, and.
to God the things that are God's," and no longer
practise a "cheat, a mockery, a delusion, and a

However, I fear that I am trespassing upon your
valuable space, but still I indulge in the hope of
your granting me•a corner in your paper on an
early day next week, for a final reply to Mr.
Robinson's speech, that I anticipate reading to-
morrow morning, and remain, meanwhile, a

SPECTATOR

Liverpool, 10th February, 1859,

P.S.—I assure Mr. Robinson that he does Me
an injustice in taunting me with being unmanly in
not giving my name. It is not want of manly or
moral courage that causes me to assume the signa-
ture of " Spectator," but my bread and cheese,
being one of those that has to practicably observe
the commandment —" six days shalt thou labour,"
&c. Yourself then, Mr. Editor; as well as Mr.
Robinson, will readily understand the necessity of
your foregoing the gratification of having my
name, and, though poor, I must defer the ambition
of becoming a " marked man."