, was a beautiful preparation of an infant _cranium_,
presented to the painter by his old friend, Surgeon Cruickshanks.
Fowler, without moving his position, continually peered at it askance
with inquisitive eye. "Ah! Master Fowler," said the painter, "that is a
mighty curiosity." "What might it be, sir, if I may be so bold?" "A
_whale's eye_," replied Gainsborough. "Oh! not so; never say so, Muster
Gainsborough. Laws! sir, it is a little child's skull!" "You have hit
upon it," said the wag. "Why, Fowler, you are a witch! But what will you
think when I tell you that it is the skull of _Julius Caesar_ when he was
a little boy?" "Do you say so!" exclaimed Fowler, "what a phenomenon!"

This reminds us of a similar story told of a countryman, who was shown
the so-called skull of Oliver Cromwell at the museum in Oxford, and
expressed his delight by saying how gratifying it was to see skulls of
great men at different ages, for he had just seen at Bath the skull of
the Protector when a youth!

SIR DAVID WILKIE AND THE BABY.

A very popular novelist and author of the present day tells the
following anecdote of the simplicity of Sir David Wilkie, with regard to
his knowledge of _infant_ human nature:--

On the birth of his first son, at the beginning of 1824, William
Collins,[3] the great artist, requested Sir David Wilkie to become one
of the sponsors for his child.[4] The painter's first criticism on his
future godson is worth recording from its simplicity. Sir David, whose
studies of human nature extended to everything but _infant_ human
nature, had evidently been refreshing his faculties for the occasion, by
taxing his boyish recollections of puppies and kittens; for, after
looking intently into the child's eyes as it was held up for his
inspection, he exclaimed to the father, with serious astonishment and
satisfaction, "He _sees_!"

MAN DEFINED SOMEWHAT IN THE LINNAEAN MANNER.

One who is partial to the Linnaean mode of characterising objects of
natural history has amused himself with drawing up the following
definition of man:--"_Simia sine cauda; pedibus posticis ambulans;
gregarius, omnivorus, inquietus, mendax, furax, rapax, salax, pugnax,
artium variarum capax, animalium reliquorum hostis, sui ipsius inimicus
acerrimus._"

Montgomery translated the description thus:--

"Man is an animal unfledged,
A monkey with his tail abridged;
A thing that walks on spindle legs,
With bones as brittle, sir,