The times., 1898-04-14
From the Boston Herald)

(From the Boston Herald.)
'.Seems to me | told you once" said the old
circus man, % about the giraffe having a sore
throat? 1t is a serious matter for any giraffe to
have sore throat; bad for the giraffe, and bad
for the owner. When you come to take an Is
foot giraffe like ours. sore throat means large
expense and large amount OF trouble; and the
big fellow hadn't much more'n got over this
before something else happened to him that gave
us even more trouble. He caught cold, and the
cold settled in his throat-I suppose he was still
sensitive there-and it gave him stiff neck so
that he couldn't bend his neck at all.
'sYou can't have any idea of what stiff neck
means until you a giraffe affected in that
way; we'd had all sorts OF trouble with animals
in one way or another, but for real bother this
beat 'em all. We discovered it one day on the
road. The giraffe always ducked his head under
the branches that hung down, sorter like n swan
goose does, but this day, carrying his head
right up straight in the air, he brought up
against branch that was at least fifteen feet
above the ground. That was such an amazing
thing that we knew something must be the mat.
ter, and when the girahe's keeper came up and
spoke to him, all he did was to bend his nose
down and look down; why, we saw he couldn't
bend his neck and then We knew what was the
matter.
..Well, of course the first thing did
to set a man to march alongside of him with
a ten-foot pole, with crotch IN the end OF 1t,
to lift the branches for him. Most OF the time
almost all the time, in fact-wo could steer him
clear of overhanging branches, and of course,
lots of the way there long stretches where
there wasn't any trees at all; and then we'd
come TO places where the would have to lift
a branch to let the big giraffe go under; and
great pity ii was, too, TO see him compelled to
go about in that
''He went that way for about ten days Ordi-
narily, used to put his feed for him on top of
the animal cage, so that he wouldn't have TO
bend down than eight ten feet; but he
couldn't do that now. So set a ring in the
centerpole eighteen feet from the ground, and
we used to reeve a roupe through that and make
one end fast to the bucket with his food or
drink in it, and hoist it up and let him eat there.
On the road used TO throw the rope
the crotch of a tree at a suitable height. For
his entry to the great tent at show time we had
to cut great slit in the canvas; but we didn't
regret that, because it was a mighty impressive
thing to him march in that way. Ii made
him look thirty-siX feet tall, instead OF eighteen.
Twice day man used to go up on a lad
der and put strap around his head and we'd
hook fall, with bo'sun's chair and man
waould ride down his neck and rub in linment
He used to like that very much, and it helped
him greatly, too, and morning when the
men went out TO give him the usual rub they
We're delighted to see the old chap with his head
bowed down pretty near to the roof of the
grizzly bear cage, which stood next to him.
which showed that his neck was coming around
all right, and indicated that he'd take his
breakfast this morning in the old way, il YOU
please"