Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 May 1885 — The Parrot and the Monkey Story. [ARTICLE]

The Parrot and the Monkey Story.

A well-worn American anecdote describes the result of owning both a parrot and a monkey. When the owner of the bird and the beast comes home one day he finds the monkey decked with red and green feathers, but he does not find the parrot for a long while. At last the bird appears from an obscuro corner plucked bare save a single tail feather. He hops upon his perch with such dignity as he can muster, and says, with infinite pathos: “Oh, we have had a hell of a time!” At first nothing could seem more American than this, but my friend, Mr. Austin Dobson, has recently drawn my attention to a story essentially the same in Walpole’s letters. Yet another parrot story popular in New York, where a well-known wit happens to be a notoiious stutterer, is as little American as this of Walpole’s. The stutterer is supposed to ask the man who offers the parrot for sale if it c-c-c-can’t t-t-t-talk. “If it could not talk better than you I’d wring its neck,” is the vender’s indignant answer. I found this only the other day in Buckland’s “Curiosities of Natural History,” first published nearly a quarter of a century ago. In all probability it is yet moie ancient.— Longman's Magazine