In the rear portion of the yard which we have been visiting is an inclosure, in which three or four horned horses or ponies, called gnus, are digesting their rations; next to these is a case in which is confined a fretful porcupine, who shows his bristles on the least provocation, and sometimes when there is no insult meant at all. The catalogue of cages or boxes is completed by that in which is held in duress a Brazilian tiger of the fiercest possible description, who does nothing but glare upon you and want to eat you. The meat-eaters in the collection are fed only once a day—at noon—and cost about a dollar per day to feed; the fruit-eaters, like the elephant, eat all the time, as fancy prompts; while the vegetarians, like the monkeys, take their three square meals a day. As a rule, all animals enjoy a better average of health than man, because they have no acquired tastes or dissipated habits. The elephant lives for centuries; the parrot is a centenarian, while the lion lives but twenty years or so. On the whole, the average life of man is greater than that of the majority of the so-called beasts, though their average of health exceeds his.
Wax-works, of one kind or other, enter into the display made in the menagerie tent; but the figures all seem broken or enfeebled by long usage, and instead of being attractive, many of them are repulsive. How different from Madame Tussaud's exhibition—the prototype of all the efforts that have been made in the wax-work line! A correspondent who visited this display many years ago, when the display had a world-wide fame, wrote:—
"Madame Tussaud's famous exhibition of wax statuary and works in wax afforded me a very entertaining evening's occupation. Here are full-length portraits in wax of all the notables of the world; Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, the royal children, George III., Queen Charlotte, George IV., William IV., George II., Louis XIV., Emperor Louis Napoleon and his empress in their bridal costume, Henry VIII., Cardinal Wolsey, all the present sovereigns of Europe, Kossuth, Gen. Tom Thumb, etc., numbering nearly two hundred figures in all, so artistically arranged and so well executed that the effect upon the visitor on entering is the same as on coming into a grand drawing-room filled with noble ladies and gentlemen. So perfect is everything that you look to hear the figures speak, and can hardly convince yourself that they do not move.
"The second room of Madame Tussaud's exhibition is called the Robe Room, which contains the figure of George IV. wearing the order of the Garter. This robe was worn by his majesty in the procession to Westminster Abbey, at his coronation. To the right of this is the robe the same monarch wore at the opening of Parliament, and on the left the robe worn by the King in returning to Westminster Abbey after the coronation. The cost of these three robes was about $90,000. The third room of the exhibition is called the Golden Chamber, and contains relics of the Emperor Napoleon, among which is the camp bedstead used by Napoleon during his seven years at St. Helena, with the mattress and pillow on which he died; the coronation robe of Napoleon and the robe of the Empress Josephine; the celebrated flag of Elba; the sword worn by the Emperor during his campaign in Egypt, and many other relics of him. In another room is the carriage in which Napoleon made the campaign of Russia, and which was captured on the evening of the battle of Waterloo; also the carriage he used at St. Helena, in which, of course, I sat down, according to custom.
"In another room are many relics of the French Revolution, among which are the instruments by which the unfortunate Louis XIV. was beheaded, as also Robespierre and others. These are but a few of the many curious and interesting objects to be seen at this exceedingly entertaining exhibition; and I passed several hours here, quite lost in the examination of the collection and the recollections which the various articles awakened."
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The menagerie, no matter how small or how extensive it may be, always has much within its cages and lying around under its canvas to interest young and old alike. It is like a volume of natural history that may be forever studied without exhausting the interest that attaches to it, and the knowledge contained in it. Thrown down after a single perusal, the book is picked up again and again, and each time its pictures and pages seem as fresh and entertaining as they were in the beginning. So, too, the collection of curiosities, that now-a-days form a very important part of every tent-show, never loses its attraction for the public. Gray-haired men who in boyhood looked, open-mouthed and astonished, into the den of lions, still find the same pleasure in contemplating these wonderful beasts from a safe distance, and take delight in making their children acquainted with them. The tangled forests and matted jungles of new regions are constantly giving up new specimens of wild animal life; and with the old reliable attractions still plentiful, and startling novelties occasionally coming to the surface, there is every reason to believe that the menagerie will retain its present hold upon the hearts of the people, and last as long as there is canvas in the world to cover one or color enough to fill an ordinary stand of bills.
Now we have seen about all there is to see. Passing out and by the side-show blower with his fat woman and lean man, his glass blower and Irish Circassian girls, his juggler, and the heartless band of music he has playing at one end of his dirty tent; we move down the street, the sound of the side-show music dies out, the canvas fades behind the house-tops, and we have left the show world with all its sunshine and shadow, its laughter and tears.
CURTAIN.