Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1871-09-07
Al inc. mmorly Disagreeab.e Little
Beast.
Little


One of the most curious and inter
esting papers in the English magazines
for July, is Mr.. Leakey's account in
st. Pauls of the "Tasmanian Devil"
This Is little beast about the size of a
bull dog, but marsupial, still found in
the wilds of Van Diemens Land. II
differs in temper radically from every
known beast, and is thus described
His natural prepensities are those
of the gluttonous or sluggish kind, and
he will be quiet enough when gorged
with flesh and left to undisturbed re
pose, but the slightest provocation, the
merest and most unintentional obser-
walton, will turn him nj once into a YER
liable tiend. He then becomes in
Stantly the very type of senseless fury,
attacking all before him, dead or living
and flying with equal tierceness at a
mastiti or barn door. Nor is there,
while life is left to him, neither truce
or quarter, as long as shred of flesh
remains to tear, or last bone to shat
ter, he fights on, regardless of the num-
bers that surround him, or of his own
subsiding strength, until ut length his
jaws snap family, and his life goes
gradually out with an inf erual snarl
Though taken young, and brought up
IN captivity, his nature undergoes not
the slightest modification. He lives to
the last the same surly life, and usually
dies in some mad struggle with the
bars of his cage. After years of expert
ence he repeats the same acts of profit
less and e1hausting frenzy. Without APP
parent motive he rushes at the wall,
beating the air like rabid lunatic,
utterlng long growls that seem TO choke
him, till they break out suddenly into
Il piercing bark. He shows not the
smallest attachment to his guardians
or keepers, whom he menaces and
swears at from the moment they APP
proach him till they pass completely
out of sight. When tired ont or over
fed he becomes stupid and sleepy, rolls
himself up in corner, and falls into n
leaden slumher from which it is not al
ways easy to rouse him. Nothing can
be cheaper than to feed him. He will
be satisfied for days together with huge
bones, which he breaks up like biscuit,
and usually swallows entirely"
No animal can fight him, and he has
repeatedly been known TO beat off
whole troop of dogs, and his insane
fury gives him an inextinguishable
courage. Mr. Leayey attacked one
with five dogs, who would have been
deicated,' but that one Of them wore an
armed collar, and he describes the as
pect of the brute:
"Wlth' his back to large overhang-
Ing stone, there stood, half crouched
before the dogs, the most horrible look
ing beast imaginable. Not that his
contour was villainous; in form he re-
sembled IA badger, but his physiognomy
was literally diabolical, and quite justi-
fed his apparently exaggerated name.
What struck me first was the look of
sarcasm expressed by the drawing down
OF the corners of the lips-an expression
taken also by the ass, when over
tormeuted, and unable to intimidate or
escape from its tormentors. His Jaws
We're Just wide enough apart to reveal
his large white tSeth without parading
them, and from between these issued n
continuous growl, that seemed to un-
wind from a bobbin in his throat. But
what most arrested me was the animals
Internal eyes.
The eyes of the wildcat are said to
be the most savage-looking in nature,
but there is about them an expression
Of uncompromising ferocity which is
frank and unmistakcabe. Such might
have been the eyes of Marius. which
disarmed the ailrighted slave commits
stoned to execute him in his prison.
The eyes of the sarcophilus are small,
black, leering beads, fraught with de
sign, but close and impentrable. Such
must have been the eyes of Burke,
while hiding the plaster in his hat, and
watching the friendless Italian boy
from the dark arches Of Great Queen
street.