CHAPTER XXIX
ZOOLOGICAL GARDEN, MOSCOW: DIRECTORS, MESSRS. BAUMWALDT AND HOLTZ
How nice it was to get away from the cold wet north and see the sun again at Moscow! There was scarcely a cloud in the sky on the occasion of my first visit to the Zoological Garden at Moscow.
After entering, on payment of thirty-two kopecks, one is confronted by a large boating lake, with cages of small birds and animals on the right bank. But, as usual, let us keep to the left, and, passing some vertebræ and jaw-bones of a gigantic whale, the first house that will be encountered is the lion house, containing, amongst other things, a bay lynx of America (Felis ruta), and a serval (ever snarling), a magnificent pair of large snow leopards from Thibet, and a common leopard with three tiny babies. In another cage together are two hyænas, one dog, one wolf, and one bear. The next house contains bears, and there is a monkey house close by containing, amongst other things, a flying fox. In a paddock in the Garden, next to a Thibetan kiang, or wild ass, is a specimen of the newly discovered Prejevalsky’s wild horse. This animal came out of the herd imported by Carl Hagenbeck, and from the same herd came the specimens of the curious yellow-coloured horse now to be seen in our London Garden. Carl Hagenbeck informed me that these animals were caught in three different districts south of the Mongolian town of Kobdo, near the Altai Mountains. The horses travelled twenty days to Kobdo, and ninety-five days from Kobdo to the Siberian Railway, so that by the time they reached Europe they must have had about enough travelling. The foals are caught with slings on long sticks by the Mongols, a number of whom gallop down upon a large herd at a given signal. When caught they are fed by Mongol mares, which act as their foster-mothers.
MOOSE YARD, MOSCOW.
There were signs of great activity going on in this Garden, houses of various sorts being in course of construction in every direction, including a good new set of bear cages for the fine collection of these animals, which have now to be housed separately in various parts of the Garden. Passing a moose yard, with a North American Indian wooden shed, we mount up to a comparatively new house on a bank, and find within two Indian tusker elephants, one of which is the largest Indian elephant in Europe. It is very old, and there is a great deal of white about the head and trunk, the latter being very short in comparison with the immense body. Ten years ago it grew very savage, and has since then killed two men.
In this Garden are to be seen specimens of the Russian bison (Bos bonassus); a herd, now reduced to 500, is protected by the Czar in Lithuania, Russia. When I asked an official if it was possible to get permission to shoot one, he said it would be cheaper to kill a man. ‘It would cost you,’ he added, ‘three years’ hard labour, with a fine of 800 roubles to kill a bison; whereas, if you kill a man, it costs you only three years in Siberia, without any fine whatever.’
There were the usual concert-houses and restaurants. The Garden contains some quaintly built houses, and there are plenty of duck-ponds, trees, and grass to help to make it pretty.
As I had to await permission from the police (I was not ‘wanted’) to leave Russia, I was enabled to spend a second day in this curious and out-of-the-corner Garden. Here could be seen people out of every country in Europe, mixed up with natives of China, Thibet, Mongolia, Russian Turkestan, Russian Siberia, and other Asiatic races. I chanced upon the younger son of Herr Carl Hagenbeck, the great animal importer of Hamburg, who had just arrived with some American racoons, some Shetland ponies, and other animals. I was delighted to meet someone who could speak English, and we lunched together in the Garden. Hagenbeck told me he was awaiting from Siberia a number of roe-deer, ibex, and other animals. He said that a gorilla, one of the rarest animals in captivity, and some chimpanzees were on their way to Hamburg from West Africa.
TOWER, MOSCOW.
A fine band plays in the Garden in the afternoon, and altogether the place is quite worth a visit.