Page:Whyte-Melville--Bones and I.djvu/24

 can never mend again, and so, politely 'Returned, with thanks?'

"Forgive me: on such anatomical outrages I have no right to expect you should feel so warmly as myself.

"Millions of creatures, beautiful exceedingly, scour over the desert plains of explored Africa; in its unknown regions, millions more may be supposed to feed, and gambol, and die. What is the use of them? If you come to that, what was the use of the Emperor Theodore, or the King of the Cannibal Islands, or any other potentate who remains utterly unimpressed when we threaten 'to break off diplomatic relations?'

"Myriads of insects wheel about us in the sun's declining rays every summer's evening. Again, what is the use of them? What is the use of the dragon-fly, the bumble-bee, the speckled toad, the blue-nosed monkey, the unicorn, the wild