“Crowley was captured when very young in the forests of Africa, not far from Monrovia, Liberia. He was presented to the Central Park Museum by the Hon. Mr. Smythe, U. S. Minister to Liberia, and became a resident of New York in May 1884. He was then thought to be about six months old and weighed not far from twenty-five pounds; he was very active, and soon after his arrival a trapeze was fitted up for him on which he took great pleasure in swinging.
A pair of ninepins were obtained for him, in shape like small Indian clubs, and several wooden balls sufficiently large not to be slipped through the grating. He took great pleasure in making targets of the pins, and would hurl the balls at them with all his strength and chatter with delight when the targets were struck. Tiring of this, he would seize the pins, one in each hand, and exercise with these, not entirely according to the written rules of club exercise, but with a zest that was of equal benefit to the muscles; although, when he abandoned this practice and used them as drumsticks to batter the sides of his apartment, the uproar sometimes became too great to be endured.
“His meals were usually taken outside of his apartment. Seated in one of the office chairs about six o'clock, after his morning toilet had been made, he was handed a plate of boiled rice, sweetened with a little sugar, which he ate in genteel fashion with a spoon, and with apparent relish, often looking up at his benefactor with one eye in apparent gratitude, and only pausing an instant to wipe his spacious chin of little rivulets of rice that would trickle at times from the convex corners of his mouth.
A cup of milk would then be given him to aid the digestion of more solid food.”