On the opening of the London and North-Western Railway to Manchester (circa 1846), the Gardens reached their full dimensions, and an entrance was built to accommodate visitors alighting at Belle Vue Station. The zoological collection still clustered close round Belle Vue House and the bowling-green; indeed, the main outline and extent of the collection of the early fifties is still visible in the so-called aviary of the present day. It is divided into two compartments. The first is the more interesting. There are cages on three sides, arranged in four tiers—the highest evidently intended for the larger birds of prey, the lowest for carnivorous beasts, and the intermediate tiers for birds and small mammals. A few round cages in the other side held paroquets, and the macaw-stands were placed in the middle. A large aviary occupied the second compartment. The collection was compact and representative. About 1852 a new range of cages was built for the larger cats, and a little later the first elephant took up his residence in the Gardens.
Three cages represented the first lion and tiger house, and one of the first occupants was the King of Oudh’s ‘fighting tiger,’ purchased at a very high figure, and never surpassed since in size or nobility.
About 1870 began a time of extension and decentralization. The lion house was extended to its present size, and it proved a suitable place for breeding both lions and tigers. The other animals were housed, without much attempt at scientific order, far and wide over the extensive grounds, which had been considerably augmented by purchase, and now, with their two lakes and wooded tracts, offered innumerable picturesque cage sites. The polar bears form a beautiful picture in their light-built cage under a knoll covered with noble forest trees that dip their roots in the shady waters of the lake. A moss-grown staircase leads up to the pits which contain Himalayan black bears and a Russian brown bear. They take life easily, many reaching the age of fourteen to twenty years.
THE BEAR PITS, MANCHESTER.
Beyond the lake and water-fowl pond stands the monkey house, a large white building of Moorish design, 800 square yards in area, the boast of the Gardens and the finest in Europe. There is a central large cage (90 by 18 feet), replete with amusements, such as the village pump and well, the great wheel, aerial flight, rocking-horse, and automatic running donkeys, that never fail to please the animals and cause endless fun to the spectators. The side cages usually contain specimens of the larger baboons and the more delicate monkeys and lemurs. The house is lofty and well lighted. Ventilation is amply provided by the removal of all the windows at one end, as experience has proved that the monkeys live much better in the fresh air. Formerly, with the house kept hot and close, the mortality was high. Now, with free access to the open air, it is much lower, and every morning the whole troop can be seen sitting in the sunshine even when the ground is snow-covered. But even these animals suffer much more severely than those that are made to endure all the rigour and changes of our climate with no artificial heat whatever. The baboons, Rhesus, Bonnet, and Ringtail, all seem to improve under this régime; two drills, turned out as babies six years ago, are now perhaps the finest of their kind in Europe, and the tonic is so efficacious that ailing monkeys removed from indoors often recover with surprising rapidity.
Such success suggested a similar open-air cage for the chimpanzees, but with a heated inner chamber. These delicate animals can often be seen enjoying the fresh air even in winter. It is the custom here to educate these anthropoids, two of which, named respectively Consul I. and II., developed quite extraordinary intelligence, so great in one case as to merit and receive in life a biography that had a much larger circulation than such books usually obtain, and in death the honour of an obituary verse, which we give below, from the pen of Ben Brierley, one of Lancashire’s most honoured poets (‘Consul I.,’ 1892-93):
‘“Hadst thou a soul”?’ I’ve pondered o’er thy fate
Full many a time: Yet cannot truly state
The result of my ponderings. Thou hadst ways