“Well, I will call them what you like,” said Adams; “I suppose they are probably about as plenty in Australia as they are in California.”
Six or eight weeks after this incident, I was in the California Menagerie, and noticed that the “Golden Pigeons” had assumed a frightfully mottled appearance. Their feathers had grown out and they were half white. Adams had been so busy with his bears that he had not noticed the change. I called him up to the pigeon cage, and remarked:
“Mr. Adams, I fear you will lose your Golden Pigeons; they must be very sick; I observe they are turning quite pale.”
Adams looked at them a moment with astonishment, then turning to me, and seeing that I could not suppress a smile, he indignantly exclaimed:
“Blast the Golden Pigeons! You had better take them back to the Museum. You can’t humbug me with your painted pigeons!”
This was too much, and “I laughed till I cried,” to witness the mixed look of astonishment and vexation which marked the grizzly features of old Adams.
After the exhibition on Thirteenth Street and Broadway had been open six weeks, the doctor insisted that Adams should sell out his share in the animals and settle up all his worldly affairs, for he assured him that he was growing weaker every day, and his earthly existence must soon terminate. “I shall live a good deal longer than you doctors think for,” replied Adams doggedly; and then, seeming after all to realize the truth of the doctor’s assertion, he turned to me and said: “Well, Mr. Barnum, you must buy me out.” He named his price for his half of the “show,” and I accepted his offer. We had arranged to exhibit the bears in Connecticut and Massachusetts during the summer, in connection with a circus, and Adams insisted that I should hire him to travel for the season and exhibit the bears in their curious performances. He offered to go for $60 per week and travelling expenses of himself and wife. I replied that I would gladly engage him as long as he could stand it, but I advised him to give up business and go to his home in Massachusetts; “for,” I remarked, “you are growing weaker every day, and at best cannot stand it more than a fortnight.”
“What will you give me extra if I will travel and exhibit the bears every day for ten weeks?” added old Adams, eagerly.
“Five hundred dollars,” I replied, with a laugh.
“Done!” exclaimed Adams, “I will do it, so draw up an agreement to that effect at once. But mind you, draw it payable to my wife, for I may be too weak to attend to business after the ten weeks are up, and if I perform my part of the contract, I want her to get the $500 without any trouble.”