the hungry lions equally with the artistic visitors to the Zoo, as
feeding-time approaches. At two o’clock p.m., the animals awake, stretch
themselves, and yawn, showing the width of their enormous jaws, and rows
of gleaming teeth. The public grows interested, and the artists
desponding. Even the little lad in knickerbockers, the work on whose
easel suggests the story of Michael Angelo’s first essay in sculpture,
drops his brushes and runs to the steps at the back to watch his sitters
in action. Then follows the _mauvais quart d’heure_ before dinner,—in
this case unduly protracted. All the beautiful lithe creatures, pacing
ceaselessly to and fro, noiseless as ghosts, seem to be performing a
kind of “grand chain,” which becomes faster and faster as their
impatience and hunger increase. As the howling of the wolves in their
distant cages is heard by the lions, excitement breaks beyond control,
and the roars of the hungry beasts only cease as the truck of food is
emptied. As a spectacle, the sight has a certain interest. But except
for those whose imagination can picture no other side of animal life in
daily contact with man, it is, perhaps, the worst moment to select in
order to appreciate the real character of those most friendly beasts,
the lions and tigers at the Zoo. In the early morning hours, when their
“sitting-rooms” have been duly swept and strewn with fresh sawdust, and
their toilet—which is always completed in their sleeping-chambers—is
finished, the iron doors are opened, and the owners of the different
cages come leisurely out to greet the day, each in its humour as the
night’s sleep or natural temper dictates.
On the last occasion on which the writer waited on the tigers’ _levée_,
it was evident that some disagreement had marked the morning hours. The
tigress from Hyderabad came out with a rush, and greeted the world with
a most forbidding growl. She then stood erect, like a disturbed cat,
switching her tail to and fro, and after examining every corner of the
cage, summoned her mate with a discontented roar. The tiger then stalked
out, and endeavoured to soothe his partner with some commonplace caress,
which apparently soothed her ruffled nerves, for after sharpening her
claws upon the floor, she lay down, and, rolling over on her back, with
paws folded on her breast, and mouth half-open, went most contentedly to
sleep. The pair of tiger-cubs in the next cage were still sleeping the
long sleep of youth, one making a pillow of the other’s shoulder.
Tigers, it may be observed, do not sleep like cats, but resemble in all
their attitudes of repose the luxurious languor of some petted
house-dog, constantly rolling over on their backs, and sticking up their
paws, with heads upon one side, and eyes half-opened. This pair of cubs
was presented by the Maharanee of Odeypore in 1892. Both cubs, when
called by the keeper, can be stroked and petted like cats. But no tiger
which has yet lived in Regent’s Park has been so completely tamed as the
fine northern tiger “Warsaw” from Turkestan, which died last winter,
after living in the Zoo since 1886. Taking into account the hardships
endured by a wild animal in its transport from the distant steppes of
Central Asia, across the Caspian Sea, thence by rail to the Euxine, and
finally by ship to England, it is difficult to maintain the belief in
the “innate ferocity” of the tiger after making the acquaintance of
“Warsaw.”
The way in which this tiger found its way to the Zoo is typical of the
unexpected means by which the menagerie is supplied with rare animals.
Colonel Stafford, who had been engaged on the Afghan Boundary Commission
in 1885, was returning by land through Central Asia, when he found the
tiger, in a little cage, waiting at the terminus on the eastern side of
the Caspian, and destined for some scientific gentleman at Warsaw. As
the northern tiger was almost unknown in England, and there seemed some
delay in the arrival of the purchase-money, Colonel Stafford bought it
for the Indian Government, who approved of his investment, and presented
it to the Zoological Society. To get the tiger by the Russian Central
Asian railway to the Black Sea, and thence to England, was no easy
matter. In the first place, the railway officials objected that tigers
were not scheduled in their bill of charges, and unlike the English
station-master, who held that cats is dogs, and rabbits is dogs, and
parrots is dogs, maintained that tigers were tigers, and ought to be
paid for at exceptional rates, including, of course, a bribe to the
officials. This view being disputed by the tiger’s owner, it remained at
the station, where, being not only quite tame, but an adept at small
tricks, it became a general favourite. Its great performance was that of
raising a basin of water and pouring it over its head; and this
accomplishment, displayed before the daughter of the superintendent of
the line, ultimately secured the tiger a passage to the sea. At Poti it
was shipped for Constantinople, being supplied with a small flock of
sheep as food in case the voyage was protracted. The animal remembered
and recognized his first purchaser long after it had found a
resting-place at the Zoo, though not at so long an interval as that
after which the lion in the Tower showed its affection for its old
keeper. This lion, which a certain Mr. Archer, employed at the Court of
Morocco, “had brought up like a puppy-dog, having it to lie on his bed,
until he grew as great as a mastiff, and no dog could be more gentle to
those he knew,” was sent to the Tower, where, after an interval of seven
years, he recognized one John Bull, a servant of his master, who,
according to Captain John Smith, “went with divers of his friends to see
the lions, not knowing that his old friend was there. Yet this rare
beast smelt him before he saw him, whining, groaning, and tumbling with
such an expression of acquaintance, that, being informed by the keepers
how he came, Bull so prevailed that the keepers opened the grate, and
Bull went in. But no dog could fawn more on his master than the lion on
him, licking his feet and hands, and tumbling to and fro, to the wonder
of all the beholders. Bull was quite satisfied with this recognition,
and managed to get out of the grate; but when the lion saw his friend
gone, no beast, by bellowing, roaring, scratching, and howling, could
express more rage and sorrow; neither would he either eat or drink for
four whole days afterwards.” “Warsaw’s” affections were not put to so
severe a test; but his forbearance may be judged from the fact that he
would allow his paws to be pulled out between the bars, and his toes to
be examined, to see _whether his nails wanted cutting_.
This amiability is very difficult to explain, unless on the ground that
the tiger was captured when very young, though many cubs are ferocious
when only a few months old. Another northern tiger, from China, which
came as a half-grown specimen to the Gardens three years ago, was as
tame as “Warsaw,” though it had suffered much in captivity, and died
before attaining its full size. It was starved in China, and never
recovered this early ill-usage, its brief life being a succession of
illnesses; but its temper was never soured, and it was far more
demonstratively affectionate than any cat. For some months it was kept
in invalid quarters at the back of the house, and its loud “purrs” could
be heard at the end of the passage the moment its keepers entered. It
ran up and down its cage, rubbing against the bars, with its tail
standing stiffly up, and delighted to have its head and ears rubbed and
patted. Sutton, and the keepers more especially concerned with the Lion
House, took all possible care of it, and after nursing it through an
illness in which it lost all its fur, they succeeded in bringing it into
condition to be shown. But the tiger soon became sick again, and after a
long illness, in which it was kept alive mainly by the care and
affection of the keepers, it died, much lamented.
Tameness is by no means confined to the northern species of tiger.
“Jack,” an Indian tiger, which died in the same year as “Warsaw,” was
quite as friendly to its keepers, and surpassed him in beauty. For some
time it shared with the Sokoto lion the place of honour as the finest
creature in the Gardens. When it arrived, in 1888, as a five-months-old
cub, it was led by a chain and collar like a big dog, and was for some
time taken to and from its cage by the keepers with no other precaution,
until its reluctance to be shut up when it preferred to walk at large,
and the difficulty of “coercing” so large an animal, led to its
permanent incarceration. “Jack” was the tiger which, in the experiments
with different musical instruments subsequently described, displayed so
marked an objection to the sounds of the piccolo.
In spite of the deaths of the three tigers, of “Duke,” the old lion, and
of a jaguar and puma, the years 1892-1894 have seen an increase in the
numbers of the inmates of the Lion House greater than at any period
since the return of the Prince of Wales from his Indian visit, and the
collection of so many fine young animals gives a good idea of the
difference in “points” and form in creatures of the same species. There
is as much difference in lions as in horses or in dogs of the same
breed, and they are by no means uniformly noble or impressive to look
upon. Some are “down at heel,” some narrow-chested, others have Roman
noses, a very ugly feature in a lion; some, on the other hand, are all
that a lion should be.
[Illustration:
LION AND LIONESS. From a photograph by Gambier
Bolton.
]
By far the finest pair in the Gardens are the lion presented to the
Queen by the Sultan of Sokoto, and the pale lioness bred in the
Amsterdam Zoological Gardens. Those in the “fancy” say, that if the
Sokoto lion had a black mane it would be the finest in Europe, except
that in the Clifton Zoological Gardens. Its coat and mane are the colour
of red gold-dust, its head twice the size of that of the lioness, its
eyes a clear brown, and its gaze steady and tranquil. Its body is
compact, its limbs straight, and its attitudes unconsciously striking
and magnificent. The lioness is a very pale fawn, almost cream colour,
and the damask spots of cub-hood were still visible on her legs and feet
when she was three years old. In temper she is as savage and ferocious
as her partner is gentle. As far as points go she is almost perfect,
with a long straight back, round black-tipped ears, short strong legs,
square head, flat forehead, rounded, cushioned feet, and a chest like a
bull-dog’s.
The only other creature which is equally ferocious is a very old
tigress, called “Minnie.” The writer has seen her “stalk” a keeper, when
his back was turned, and there is little doubt that the scene was an
exact reproduction of what takes place in an Indian jungle. She crouched
down on the floor of the den, her body gradually flattening out until
she seemed all head. The jaw was flat on the ground, and the tail also,
with only the tip moving, and the profile of the head seemed flattened
as well as the body. Thus she remained for a minute or more, the only
movement besides that in the tip of the tail being the rush of dust upon
the floor, as a blast of growls sent the sawdust flying which strewed
the planks. This was followed by the spring, which was of course
interrupted by the bars. But the whole performance was an instructive
lesson in tiger tactics.
Over-feeding in youth is almost as bad for the future health of a tiger
or lion as starvation. In 1893 three very fine tiger cubs, about five
months old, arrived as a present to the Princess Henry of Battenberg
from an Indian prince. They had been so lavishly fed on mutton during
the voyage, that they were immensely fat and heavy when they reached the
Gardens. A few months later they all developed weakness in the
hind-quarters, and though they may in time recover, the effects of
over-stimulating food taken too early are very noticeable.[2]
Footnote 2:
One has since died.
In the last cage of the house, at the eastern end, took place the
celebrated fight in November 1879, between a tiger and a tigress, which
resulted in the death of the latter. An account of this scene, derived
from Sutton the keeper’s description of what took place, is almost the
last thing written by Frank Buckland, who himself died in the December
of the next year. The description of the fight as it appears in the
collection of _Notes and Jottings from Animal Life_, selected and
arranged by Buckland shortly before his death, and edited by Mr. G. C.
Bompas in 1882, agrees very closely with the description given verbally
by Sutton himself. But the most curious point in Buckland’s account is,
that he apparently forgot that the tigress died from her wounds, though
he himself paid his last visit to the Lion House in order to see the
suffering animal. The tigress began the quarrel by sticking one of her
claws through the tiger’s nostril. The male tiger immediately pulled
back his head with a jerk, and the claw cut its way through the nose,
causing great pain and bleeding. The only people in the house at this
time—Sunday morning—were Sutton the keeper and a Frenchman, and the two
tigers at once joined battle with very little chance of interference by
outsiders. The male used his feet, and throwing the female down, gave
her several heavy blows and scratches, and then, having asserted its
power, gave up the combat. The tigress got up, followed him, and bit him
in the thigh. This made the tiger furious. He rushed at the other, and
bit her through and through the neck, while the most fearful growls and
screams came from both. This set a lion (Duke) and lioness fighting at
the opposite end of the house, while the Frenchman, shouting and
gesticulating, rushed up and down, and further excited the animals.
Sutton quieted the lions, and then managed to drive the tiger off his
victim. The moment he let go his hold the blood spouted from the
tigress’s throat up to the roof, and she fell down apparently dying,
while the tiger was driven into one of the sleeping compartments. The
tigress was also moved into a room at the back. Buckland in his short
account says, that “though of course her nerves were considerably
shaken, she was soon all right again.” As a matter of fact, she died ten
days later, having been unable to swallow food during that time, and
being dreadfully exhausted from her wounds. The strangest thing in
connection with this encounter and Buckland’s note is, that his visit to
see the wounded tigress was his own last day in the Lion House. He was
anxious to do what he could for the creature, and volunteered a visit,
though so ill himself that he had to be pushed into the passage between
the dens and the outdoor runs in a bath-chair. But his nerves were so
shaken by illness, that when the iron shutter was about to be opened
which led into the tigress’s sick chamber, he begged that it might be
kept closed; and though assured that the animal could not move, he would
not see it or have the door unclosed. A year later he himself was dead,
by no one more regretted than by the keepers of the Zoo.
The paragon of the Lion House at the present moment is the snow leopard.
It is a most lovely creature, and deserves all the praises lavished on
it. It is exactly like a grey but spotted Angora cat, six feet long from
its pink nose to the tip of its bushy tail, and of an exquisite pearly
tint, just dashed and spotted with black. Its eyes, liquid and large,
with swimming black pupils, are the colour of a greenish-grey
aqua-marine, and its expression as gentle as its ways. It was a lady’s
pet in India, and still remains the same gentle, aristocratic, languid
creature that it was when the favourite of the “Mem Sahib’s”
drawing-room. Its neighbour, the pure black leopard from Singapore, sent
to England by the Duke of Newcastle, is a strange contrast in colour and
character. It is so ferocious, that when let loose in the cage it sprang
at the bars with such force as to bulge the steel netting with which
they had been covered, by the mere shock of contact with its head. It
sulks day and night, and is no more admirable in appearance than a
morose and gigantic black tom-cat.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
DIVING BIRDS AT THE ZOO.
SUBMARINE boats, according to the naval architects, would be the fastest
in the world, if only their crews could work them. This seems a hard
saying; but the fact can be proved by theory, and seen at work in
nature. On the surface most of the work done goes to form waves. Below,
no waves are made, as, for example, when salmon are travelling up a
stream. There remains, of course, some resistance to the submerged boat
or bird, but so much less than on the surface, that, given the same
driving power, the speeds below water are thrice or four times greater
than above, the evidence of which proposition may be seen either in Mr.
Froude’s experimental basin, near Fort Gilkicker at Stokes Bay, or any
morning at 12 o’clock in the glass tank in the Fish House at the Zoo,
when the diving birds are fed.
Unlike the submarine boats, all of which are more or less alike, the
submarine birds show the most obvious and extreme differences of design,
both in body and propelling machinery. Yet they all get their living in
exactly the same way, by chasing and catching fish in deep water far
below the surface. Cormorants, for instance, have been taken in
crab-pots set at a depth of 120 feet; penguins are found miles out at
sea, though they generally return to the “rookery” at night; and puffins
and guillemots also fish during the whole of the hours of daylight away
from the coast, in deep water. The “darters” are inhabitants of American
and African lakes. At the present time there is an unusually large
collection of all these species in the Zoological Gardens. The most
amusing and probably the best performers under water are the small
black-footed penguins. These have for neighbours a young puffin, a
couple of pairs of guillemots, and a rare and beautiful cormorant, in
shape like the English bird, but with a white breast and large
sapphire-blue eyes; opposite these live a pair of “darters.” Except the
puffin, none of these birds in the least resemble the penguins, which,
as a glance shows, are strangely altered from the usual bird shape for
some particular purpose. The penguin has a large, round, intelligent
head, a deep, boat-shaped bill, and short neck. It cannot fly—in the
air—it cannot walk, but hops as if its feet were tied together; it
cannot even swim. Submarine flight is its only form of motion—it is a
winged seal. The darters, on the other hand, have long, snake-like
necks, beaks like a wooden spit, heads only large enough to support the
bill and to bold a pair of eyes, no brains to speak of, long, narrow,
sparsely-feathered wings and tail, and strong webbed feet. As they
stand, with wings spread out to dry, and the light shining through the
pink skin and membranes, their descent from some very early form of bird
suggests itself at once, though the anatomists forbid us to jump to the
conclusion that the darters are saurian-birds as the penguins are
seal-birds.
The submarine flight of the penguin is perhaps the most beautiful form
of animal movement known; certainly it is the most beautiful which we
can see and admire with our own eyes. The motions of flight in the air,
though now analyzed and laid before us in the exquisite drawings of M.
Marey, must always remain something which must be taken on faith;
transcripts made by other eyes than ours, records of the camera and the
sun. The true movements of flight, so made familiar to our brain, may in
part be detected afterwards by the naked eye. Yet the speed and
direction of birds’ flight in air, and the necessary distance between
them and ourselves, which every beat makes greater, must always leave it
something of a mystery. But the change of medium from air to water gives
an added charm to flight. The substitution of aqueous for aërial poise
detracts nothing from the wonderful powers of the wing. But it adds two
conditions. In the first place, the whole scene is directly cognizable
by our senses. All the wonderful phenomena of flight can be watched from
a distance of a few feet, or even inches, from the eye. The simile of
the caged butterfly does not apply to the diving bird in its tank, which
exhibits its powers, pursuing its prey up and down in this space of a
few feet as well as it could in the open ocean. In the next, the water
does for the diving bird what it does for all its true children, be they
birds or fish or plants or flowers; it adds a lustre and beauty, a
something of “sea-change,” whose effects not even sunlight can surpass.
The plumage of the birds undergoes a transmutation in the “waves’
intenser day,” which seems to fit them for everlasting flight in the
palaces and grottos of the sea-nymphs, across which they fly, bearing
bubbles of sunlight from above, scattering them through their chambers
like crystal globes of fire. Those who have seen Sir E. Burne Jones’
painting of the mermaid, _In the Depths of the Sea_, will guess the
means by which this glimpse of the water world was made possible, and
realize in part the effect which the beauties so disclosed produce upon
the senses, from the use which the gifted artist made of them in this,
one of the few successful efforts made to paint a submarine scene.
The greater part of the end of the Fish House is crossed by a large
reservoir, some five feet deep and ten wide, with a glass front. The
light strikes upon it from above, and for all purposes of vision the
spectator might be standing on the sea-floor, and looking along the
vista which is level with his eye. Every movement of the birds can be
seen and noted from the moment of their first plunge till their exit up
the sloping board which leads to their cages. Like most other animals at
the Zoo, these birds are only fed once a day, and the appearance of the
keeper with his pail of live gudgeon is the signal for sudden and
intense excitement in the cages. The penguins wave their little flippers
and waddle to the door, whence they peer eagerly down the wooden steps
leading to the pool; the cormorant croaks and sways from side to side,
and the darters poise their snaky heads and spread their bat-like wings.
At the water’s edge the penguins do not launch themselves upon the
surface like other water-fowl, but instantly plunge beneath. Once below
water an astonishing change takes place. The slow, ungainly bird is
transformed into a swift and brilliant creature, beaded with globules of
quicksilver where the air clings to the close feathers, and flying
through the clear and waveless depths with arrowy speed, and powers of
turning far greater than in any known form of aërial flight. The rapid
and steady strokes of the wings are exactly similar to those of the air
birds, whilst its feet float straight out level with the body, unused
for propulsion, or even as rudders, and as little needed in its progress
as those of a wild duck on the wing. The twists and turns necessary to
follow the active little fish are made wholly by the strokes of one wing
and the cessation of movement in the other; and the fish are chased,
caught, and swallowed without the slightest relaxation of speed, in a
submarine flight which is quite as rapid as that of most birds which
take their prey in mid-air. In less than two minutes some thirty gudgeon
are caught and swallowed below water, the only appearance of the birds
on the surface being made by one or two _bounds_ from the depths, when
the head and shoulders leap above the surface for a second and then
disappear. Any attempt to remain on the surface leads to ludicrous
splashing and confusion—for the submarine bird cannot float, it can only
fly below the surface. Immediately the meal is finished, both penguins
scramble out of the water, and shuffle with round backs and drooping
wings back to their cage to dry and digest.