The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-12-30 00:00:00

NEW FABLE OF THE WOLF AND THE LAMB,

(From the Speech of Dr. ettuke, at the Be Festival.)

The gentry remind use of the well-kown fable of the shep.
herds, the bops, lee wide and the sheep. Ouce on a time—When
you call discover yourselves—a goodly flock of sheep and lambs
were grazing in a meadow ; they beiengea to careful seepherds,
who tended theta by day, and by wateutul s, who guardedthem by night. In a neighbouring mountain triere liveu a park
01 gaunt and hungry wolves, and they used to approach the
sheet,, and look at them till their, teeth watered, and louget:t to
be picking their bones. .(Hear.) liut. their lunging was ail
in vain. dome were killed by &he shepherus, and others worried
by the dogs, and not a pick of mutton could be gut in all Wulf-
land, whether fat love or money. (Hear, hear.) .At last, one
old politic Wolf, with a very long tail—(hear, and a laugh)
resolved, fur the love he bate to Wolf-laud and himself—(hear,
hear)—to attempt a conciliation with the sheep. lie, accord•
ingly, put on a look as innocent,as any lamb, and whispered,
in a voice as sweet as any Miss in her teens, and addressing
himself to one of. theta in Irish. (Hear, and a laugh.) I
•tot-
got to tell you-he was an Irish wolf, 403 therefore, entitled to
use his native tongue. Welt; as I told you, addressing himself
to her in Irish, " Allah Sacuarnha Peetish," says he, come
to put the cumehither upon you, and settle a perpetual league,
defensive and offensive, between you and our family. The flock,
I should have told you, belonged tolarmer Williams—(hear,
hear)—and he was accustomed to mark their sides with three
orange. streaks—(immense cheering)-,--to distinguish them from
his neighbour Peter's, who usually tied a ribbon around the
necks of his flock. (Hear, hear.) Well, the poor sheep seeing
the wolf look so innocent, and hearing it whisper so low, could
not, in civility, refuse to hold a palaver through the rails of the
fold.. ." Cashla Machree"7-:(4. laugh)—says the wolf, theree
nothing on earth I wish so much as intercourse between our
families: and to prove my sincerity, I am ready to go .down on
iny knees and pray for your co-operation ,in some Important
projects for our common benefit. And what may these projects
he? say. 4 the sheep. Why, then, says the wolf, do but consider
the dogs; they are ravenous, noisy animals;. they. eat half yeur
meat, and won't allow you your natural rest through the night
with their barking. illas/ra—(a laugh)—meny's .the time 11'
wished their noisy throats were cut. (Great cheering and
laughter.) Then, as for the shepherds, see bow they drive you
out and close you in, so that we can seldom get time to en-
joy, a dish of discourse with one ituother—a laugh)—then '
they confine you in what field they think
.proper, without
rhyme or reason ; and, after All their• insults and injustices,
they sheer your fleece and make eoats of it. Agrah, let me feel
your wool. Put a good judge of these things. I was.bred in soy
youth to the fleecing business, and now, jewel, the fleecing bu 7
siness is bread (kat to me. (Hear, hear, and a laugh.) But
surely, replied the sheep, your family have done, and are still
disposed to do, injulies to ours. Don't you say a sheep must
never bleat, but howl; and is it not one of your laws, that none
of our family should be allowed to live above a twelvemonth ?
Ay, ay, that, agrah, says the wolf, was the law in the old times;
and the law, I must acknowledge, can never. change; but the
wolves themselves are-changed altogether entirely. (Hear,
and a laugh.) But have you not still very dangerous tusks
and talons? added.the sheep. Look now, said the wolf, open-
ing his mouth from ear to ear; look into mylitouth and you
will see I have been with the dentist, and he has extracted my
dog-tusks, and filed my whole mouth as smooth and flat as the
grinders of a horse in his seventh year. Put in your pretty lit-
tle foot now and feel how smooth they are—(a laugh)-7and as
for the nails that yeti have heard so much about, why they're
as small and as harmless as the toes of a Itobin Redbreast!
(Hear, hear, and a laugh.) Your words, replied the sheep, are
very fair, but still I'm afraid to trust you. Oh! I can soon set-
tle- that point, said the-wolf, for as you doubt my honest word,
I'll give you ins' book oath. (Hear, nide laugh.) .That's quite
a new view of the matter, added the sheep, su let me hear what
you will swear. Then, said the wolf, , .
" I do swear that T will, to the utmost of my power, defend
the settlement of property in this.' meadow;' es by law (' of this
sheepfold established. I sdleninly dis Claim, disavow, and ab-
jure any intention of. subverting the established right of entry
to the lamb's paddock.' And 1 swear that I will never use any
privilege 1 am, or may be posSessed of, to weaken the
kin's health,' or disturb their' paternal and maternal' govern-
ment."

And then, said he, laving his paw upon his breast,," all this,
in the common and ordinary acceptation of the words, withbitt
equivocation or mental res,rvatiou—all this I sWear upon the
honour of a wolf." (Hear, hear, and loud laughter) Upon
this compact it is recorded, in the annals of Sheep-land, the
shepherds were turned off, and the dogs were muzzled, the sheep
were alloWed one meal a-day, the wolVes appropriated—(hear)
—the remainder to the purposes of the general and conjoint
education of the two familiei; but before the end of the year
the lambs were all devoured, not in breach of any part itf the
contract,, for the wolves observed it to the letter; by order of the
chief physician, who discovered that lamb's flesh was the most
nourishing food for the stomach of a famished wolf!

CONSUMPTION OF ANIMAL FOOD IN ONSAT BRITAIN.—'I he
change that has taken place during the last half century, in the
consumption of butcher's meat, is still more extraordinary than
that which has taken place its the consumption of corn.. The
quantity made use of has been wonderfully increased, and its
quality signally improved. From 1740 to about 1750, the popu-
lation of the metropolis fluctuated very little; amounting, during
the whole of that 'period, to about 670,000 nr.,675,000. Now,
during the ten y'ea's ending with 1730, there were,,at an average
about 74,000 head of cattle, and about 570,000 head of sheep
sold Annually in Smithfield market. Its 1831 the population
had increased to 1,472,000, or in the ratio ahout 218 per Cent: -
and at air average of the three years ending with 1831, 156,041
head of cattle, and 1,238.000 head of:Sheep were annually sold
at -Smithfield ; being an increase of 212 per cent: on the cattle,
and of 217 per cent. on the sheep,-as compared with the Putn-
•bers sold in 1740 —5O. It consequently appeals that the number
of cattle and sheep consumed iu Londou has increased, since
1740, about in the same proportion as the population. The
weight of the animals, has,
,however, a good deal more than
doubled in the interval. In the earlier part of bit century the
gross weight of the cattle sold at Smithfield did 'not, at an
average, exceed 3701b5.; and, that of the sheep did not exceed
281b5.; wheieas, at present, the average weight of the cattle is
estimated at about 8001bs., and that of the sheep at about 801b4.
Hence, on the most moderate computation, it may
,be affirmed
that the consumption ;of butcher's meat in the metropolis, as
compared with the population, is twice as great it thii menient
as in 1740 or 1750. * • The demand for hatcher's 'meat in
Scotland has increased in the most extraordinary Manner. So
late as 1763, the slaughter of bullocks fur the supply of the pith-
lie market was a thing wholly unknown even, in Glaigow,
thotigh the city had then a population of nearly 30.000 ! Pre-
viously to 1775, or perhaps later, it was customary in Edin-
burgh, Plasgow, and the principal Scotch towns, for familieS 'to
purchase, in .November, what would now be reckoned a small
miserable, half fed cow or OK, the salted carcase of which was
the only butcher's meat they tasted throughout the year. In
the smaller towns and country districts this practice prevailed
till the present century. but it is now almost everywhere aban-
doned. The consumption of butcher's meat in Glasgow, As
compared with the population, does not at present• differ mate-
rially from that of the metropolis. We do not, indeed, believe
that the command of the people of any country over food and
all sorts of conveniences ever increased. in any equal period,
half so rapidly as that of the people of Scotland has done since
1770.—M Culloch's Statistical Account of the British Empire.