The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1873-02-06
HOW | TOOK UP WITH DARWIN,
AND WHY | WENT BACK
ON HIM.

1t was not without reluctance-T had
almost said it was upon compulslon-that
accepted the Darwinian theory. had
always felt an honest pride in my ances-
try, and greatly preferred Eve, apple and
all, to the handsomest she monkey that
ever grew. The more I read about the
prehistoric" the more i voted Darwin q
horrid old humbug. Monkeys, forsooth !
He might speak for himself, but not for
the rest of us, thank Heaven Tenacious
ly [ clungto the faith of my fathers; but
there is no use fighting against fate. My
apostacy was fore-ordained-I wa d DOM
ed to go back on gene .logy, and I went.
However, / want you to Understand it
wasn't Darwin who did it, His finely
rounded parag raphs, his high sounding
phrases, and elegant rhetoric we're no
more convincing to me than the story of
Old Mother Hubbard | may as well
state that l am strictly conservative |
indulge in DO enthusiasms. / can't ex
actly comprehend the harmony of nature,
though understand Yankee Doodle But
'iacts is facts" The unanswerable argu.
ment in favor of the descent of man came
to me in the form of a modern female
She was fearfully and wonderfully made
Her hair told the whole story You
would have supposed that all monkeydom
had, together and ct one time, Invested
themselves of their hilsute adornments,
and handed them down il q heap to that
particular piece of postelity. ct is my
own individual, private opinion that the
monkey never got her up alone; her
'hump" was evidently the work of some
miserable, good for nothing old camel, who
ought to have been taken for NAL practice.
Her feet, Cramped and tortured after the
style OF the pig-tail people, were mounted
on elegant, little French stills, and cat-
tered around beautifully. Her gewgaws
and ornaments outdid the veritable Hot
have white washed a good sized hen coop.
Then she had other things besides her
hair, and her hump, and her paint, and
her jewelrY, and her French stills; and
the sight of them oyercame me so that |
could only feebly calculate, Darwin is
right" When once accepted the mon
Key pedigree, was bound to stick to it,
and made myself believe | couldn't have
given two flps of a farthing for the diff
3rence between father Adam and grand
father Ape. | knew whereof affirmed,
and no tidal wave of reason should DRIFT
me fr IN my moorings. But, alas! we can t
most always tell 1t was School Board
upset me next time. An "educated fool''
: long-winded saint to his patrons, a
pugilistic Heenan to his pupils had
struck boy in the face, hence the con.
viction Of the herein. before mentioned
Board, j e, wooden men. They heard
he evidence; but what business had the
boy to be little, and helpless, and weak?
He might Just as we'll have been twenty
years old as ten, and then he could have
struck back.
The idiOcy of that Board was too much
for my pet theory. felt for the monkeys
The poor, innocent, long suffering, much
abused monkeys The cute, crafty, Gun
ming, cheerful, chatterlng monkeys! The
good, gentle, gracious, gibbering, little
Monkeys What on earth had they ever
done, that they should be thus mis- repre-
sented and soandalized, and libelled, and
maIigned, as to be called relative OF
bat thing in spectacles? Monkeys, in.
deed! Darwin should have seen that
School Board. and made it iackasses!
! u. BETT