Mankind Indicted.

The gorilla scratched himself where we would never scratch ourselves in public. But he was an old silver back and the meeting he was addressing expected nothing less of him.

“ You all know why we are here .” he began and then proceeded to tell them as is the wont of chairmen , using a hundred words where ten would have done. He was short of breath and had to pause frequently.

“ We have to discuss the fate, the destiny, the ultimate ontological (gasp!) conclusion ( “Oh when is this going to end?” thought the meerkat.) of mankind, humanity, homo (pause) sapiens.”

There was an interruption.. The listening animals burst into gusts of sardonic laughter. The gorilla actually stopped and looked totally nonplussed. The irony of a species that had reduced itself to the point of extinction should call itself sapiens , i.e. wise, passed him by. I shall not report the rest of his remarks for fear that this report would develop the dimensions of War and Peace. Two issues faced the animals. Was mankind worth saving and if “yes” how?

A raddled old lioness spoke up first. Lions were like that . They assumed superiority. Despite her hide looking like a threadbare carpet her speech was clear and impelling.

“ I have to confess that with increasing maturity I have developed a taste for humans recently. The older ones are a bit tough and some of the smaller bones need watching out for.”

“ I have the same trouble with fish.” interrupted a bear. “ I was thinking we might breed humans for entertainment. They can be made to dance which is fun and when they fight each other...wow!”

The lioness scowled at the bear and said very slowly and emphatically. “ I was going to suggest that we farm them. “

She had to be careful for he was much stronger than she was. A frosty confrontation threatened. This was interrupted a refined voice

“We can do both, but we must have some for entertainment. They are so cute and their lovely voices quite entrance me. “ It was a meerkat.

There then followed a lengthy dissertation on the virtues of consensus and compromise from the verbose gorilla. This was so boring that one of the tortoises present did not simply fall asleep but actually fell into hibernation. The lengthy and tedious speech had progressed the meeting by not even a millimetre.

The attention of the meeting was then grabbed by a Rhesus monkey. “They could be useful to us” said the monkey.

She then went on to describe in graphic detail the things man had done to her species. Mothers moved to cover their offspring's ears. The sloth awoke and objected to such bad taste. But the zebra said such things had to be said. He did tend to see things in term of black and white.

One of the tortoises had managed to stay awake and indicated that she wanted to speak. Before she managed to start the gorilla intervened. He pointed out that mammals were not the only class of vertebrate to occupy the planet. He described each in great and scientific detail and expanded on the division between the warm and cold blooded animals.

“We must regard as particularly gratifying how we have at this meeting managed to bridge the gap between poikilotherms and homoeotherms (the cold and warm blooded animals ).Perhaps the former will prevent us from over heated.” he went on pausing only for the other animals to show there appreciation of this latest whimsy. None of them did. He gave a little encouraging chuckle. He had never had any difficulty at laughing at his own jokes.

It was then found that the tortoise, the one who wanted to speak had retreated into her shell and fallen asleep. The meerkats vigorously shook her . Having shaken her they waited for her to re-emerge. They waited at the wrong end and were greatly surprised when she did stretch out. When she did they were astounded at the bitter tirade that followed.

“ Put them in a small cage and let them rot in their own excrement. They robbed us of our homes. Now we will rob them.!”

A sympathetic murmur arose from the animals.

An ambivalent beagle spoke up next. “ I am conflicted. Some of my kind were treated very well by the humans, Almost too well,”

“Yah humans' little pets!” snarled a nearby fox.

“ but they forced us to hunt and slaughter our near relatives.”

“Didn't stop you from enjoying it” snarled the fox.

“That's enough!” bellowed the gorilla blinking in surprise at his own terseness. The rest of the animals settled down relieved that they did not suffer a wordy diatribe on conflict resolution.

A donkey now spoke up“ They beat me, they worked me, they insulted me and nearly broke me as they did other mammals”

He was interrupted by a hoot from an owl on a tree nearby.

“ I beg your pardon,” he corrected himself “other animals. They did terrible things to us and they should have a taste of their own medicine.”

That caused the kangaroo to leap into the discussion. “All this talk of revenge! Aren't we sinking to the level of mankind ourselves?”

At this point there was a strange intervention. A passing cockroach wanted to have her say, Few could hear but the owl picked up the gist of what it was saying and relayed it to the rest of the meeting.

“She says that she is deeply insulted that an animal should even be thought of being able to sink to the level of a human being.”

There then followed a tense argument between the monkey and the kangaroo for the next quarter of an hour which the gorilla summarised in the following three quarters of an hour. Then spoke the Elephant “ Let us give man one more chance, Let us restrain our desire for revenge. Let us confine a few of them in ideal conditions and see what happens.”

There was a murmur of assent and the animals agreed on this course of action ; but the owl said” It's been tried before and it did not work out too well.

They were just about to all go off the their respective habitats when a pigeon flew in bring this message.

“Yesterday the last man was eaten. Mankind is extinct”

Peter M.Grinham 22^nd May 201