How to Tell Your Friends From the Apes

Book excerpt: Will Cuppy is one of the greatest humorists this country has produced and is still (despite eleven printings of his imperishable The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody) too little known. Here is one of his three classic "How-To's," considering notable birds and animals whose habits (and often existence) seem to have disturbed Cuppy ("Birds Who Can't Even Fly," "Optional Insects," "Octopuses and Those Things"), as well as more mundane creatures like the frog, the gnat, and the moa, who have no visible vices but whose virtues are truly awful. Spanning the breadth of the animal kingdom, Cuppy neatly classes his observations for easy reference: Problem Mammals, Pleasures of Pond Life, Birds Who Can't Sing and Know It.