Gentyll as faucon and hawke of the Towre."—Skelton.
In the reign of Charles I., a sort of Royal Menagerie took the place of the deer with which St. James's Park was stocked in the days of Henry VIII, and Queen Elizabeth. Charles II. greatly enlarged and improved the Park; and here he might be seen playing with his dogs and feeding his ducks. The Bird-cage Walk, on the south side of the Park, had in Charles's time the cages of an aviary disposed among the trees. Near the east end of a canal was the Decoy, where water-fowl were kept; and here was Duck Island, with its salaried Governor.
Evelyn, in 1664, went to "the Physique Garden in St. James's," where he first saw "orange trees and other fine trees." He enumerates in the menagerie, "an ornocratylus, or pelican; a fowle between a storke and a swan; a melancholy water-fowl, brought from Astracan by the Russian ambassador; a milk-white raven; two Balearian cranes," one of which, had a wooden leg "made by a soulder:" there were also "deere of severall countries, white, spotted like leopards; antelopes, an elk, red deer, roebucks, staggs, Guinea goates, Arabian sheepe, &c." There were "withy-potts, or nests, for the wild fowle to lay their eggs in, a little above ye surface of ye water."
"25 Feb. 1664. This night I walk'd into St. James his Parke, where I saw many strange creatures, as divers sorts of outlandish deer, Guiny sheep, a white raven, a great parrot, a storke.... Here are very stately walkes set with lime trees on both sides, and a fine pallmall."[3]
Upon the eastern island is the Swiss Cottage of the Ornithological Society, built in 1841 with a grant of 300l. from the Lords of the Treasury: it contains a council-room, keepers' apartments, steam-hatching apparatus; contiguous are feeding-places and decoys; and the aquatic fowl breed on the island, making their own nests among the shrubs and grasses.
The majority of Zoological Gardens now in existence have been founded in this century, with the exception of the Jardin des Plantes, which, although founded in 1626, did not receive its first living animals until the year 1793-1794. Hitherto, it had been a Garden of Plants exclusively.
We shall not be expected to enumerate the great Continental gardens, of which that at Berlin, half an hour's drive beyond the Brandenburg gates, contains the Royal Menagerie; it is open upon the payment of an admission fee, and generally resembles our garden at the Regent's Park. Berlin has also its Zoological Collection in its Museum of Natural History. This collection is one of the richest and most extensive in Europe, especially in the department of Ornithology: it includes the birds collected by Pallas and Wildenow, and the fishes of Bloch. The best specimens are those from Mexico, the Red Sea, and the Cape. The whole is exceedingly well arranged, and named for the convenience of students. Still, our Zoological Collection in the British Museum (to be hereafter removed to South Kensington) is allowed to be the finest in Europe.
The Zoological Society of London was instituted in 1826, and occupies now about seventeen acres of gardens in the Regent's Park. Among the earliest tenants of the Menagerie were a pair of emues from New Holland; two Arctic bears and a Russian bear; a herd of kangaroos; Cuban mastiffs and Thibet watch-dogs; two llamas from Peru; a splendid collection of eagles, falcons, and owls; a pair of beavers; cranes, spoonbills, and storks; zebras and Indian cows; Esquimaux dogs; armadilloes; and a collection of monkeys. To the menagerie have since been added an immense number of species of Mammalia and Birds; in 1849, a collection of Reptiles; and in 1853, a collection of Fish, Mollusca, Zoophytes, and other Aquatic Animals. In 1830, the menagerie collected by George IV. at Sandpit-gate, Windsor, was removed to the Society's Gardens; and 1834 the last of the Tower Menagerie was received here. It is now the finest public Vivarium in Europe.
The following are some of the more remarkable animals which the Society have possessed, or are now in the menagerie:—
Antelopes, the great family of, finely represented. The beautiful Elands were bequeathed by the late Earl of Derby, and have bred freely since their arrival in 1851. The Leucoryx is the first of her race born out of Africa. Ant-eater. Giant, brought to England from Brazil in 1853, was exhibited in Broad-street, St. Giles's, until purchased by the Zoological Society for 200l. Apteryx, or Kiwi bird, from New Zealand; the first living specimen brought to England of this rare bird. The Fish-house, built of iron and glass, in 1853, consisting of a series of glass tanks, in which fish spawn, zoophytes produce young, and algæ luxuriate; crustacea and mollusca live successfully, and ascidian polypes are illustrated, together with sea anemones, jelly-fishes, and star-fishes, rare shell-fishes, &c.: a new world of animal life is here seen as in the depths of the ocean, with masses of rock, sand, gravel, corallines, sea-weed, and sea-water; the animals are in a state of natural restlessness, now quiescent, now eating and being eaten. Aurochs, or European Bisons: a pair presented by the Emperor of Russia, in 1847, from the forest of Bialowitzca: the male died in 1848, the female in 1849, from pleuro-pneumonia. Bears: the collection is one of the largest ever made. Elephants: including an Indian elephant calf and its mother. In 1847 died here the great Indian elephant Jack, having been in the gardens sixteen years. Adjoining the stable is a tank of water, of a depth nearly equal to the height of a full-grown elephant. In 1851 the Society possessed a herd of four elephants, besides a hippopotamus, a rhinoceros, and both species of tapir; being the largest collection of pachydermata ever exhibited in Europe. Giraffes: four received in 1836 cost the Society upwards of 2,300l., including 1,000l. for steamboat passage: the female produced six male fawns here between 1840 and 1851. Hippopotamus, a young male (the first living specimen seen in England), received from Egypt in May, 1850, when ten months old, seven feet long, and six and a-half feet in girth; also a female hippopotamus, received 1854. Humming-birds: Mr. Gould's matchless collection of 2,000 examples was exhibited here in 1851 and 1852. Iguanas, two from Cuba and Carthagena, closely resembling, in everything but size, the fossil Iguanodon. The Lions number generally from eight to ten, including a pair of cubs born in the gardens in 1853. Orang-utan and Chimpanzee: the purchase-money of the latter sometimes exceeds 300l. The orang "Darby," brought from Borneo in 1851, is the finest yet seen in Europe, very intelligent, and docile as a child. Parrot-houses: they sometimes contain from sixty to seventy species. Rapacious Birds: so extensive a series of eagles and vultures has never yet been seen at one view. The Reptile-house was fitted up in 1849; the creatures are placed in large plate-glass cases: here are pythons and a rattle-snake, with a young one born here; here is also a case of the tree-frogs of Europe: a yellow snake from Jamaica has produced eight young in the gardens. Cobra de Capello, from India: in 1852, a keeper in the gardens was killed by the bite of this serpent. A large Boa in 1850 swallowed a blanket, and disgorged it in thirty-three days. A one-horned Rhinoceros, of continental India, was obtained in 1834, when it was about four years old, and weighed 26 cwt.; it died in 1850: it was replaced by a female, about five years old. Satin Bower-Birds, from Sydney: a pair have built here a bower, or breeding-place. Tapir of the Old World, from Mount Ophir; the nearest existing form the Paleotherium. Tigers: a pair of magnificent specimens, presented by the Guicoway of Baroda in 1851; a pair of clouded tigers, 1854. The Wapiti Deer breeds every year in the Menagerie.