Ladysmith news-budget. [volume] (Ladysmith, Rusk County, Wis.) 1907-1927, 1910-08-19

include such immense foreign animal firms as the
Hagenbacks. 1t is paying business, indeed,
are all businesses where the demand exceeds the
supply. The demand for wild beasts is far greater
than the supply, and a consequence prices are
good, and the dealers men of wealth. The extent
of this demand may be appreciated when one con-
siders that most of the great cities in the United
States have geological parks or menageries, and
that the animals constantly being purchased
by them. Then there private collectors and
circuses and the like that ready to pay
the highest prices for desirable animals. The ami
nal dealer who could secure and bring to this
country three or four gorillas would make small
fortune. But no dealer has ever succeeded in do
ing this The gorillas die in few weeks in cap
tivity; they could not stand ocean trip for
day.
A rusty old German liner lumbers noisily into
Quarantine, and then lies motionless on the tide.
An officer with broad red, bewhiskered face,
stands at the head of the companion ladder, and
he smiles peculiar smile, as husky screaming
ululation rises from below. THE animals are get
ting hungry" he explains; you know have
several hundred of them on the tween decks
Want to see them? All right" In another minute
probably the most competent animal man In the
world is at our side. He is not trainer. or even
tanner; he is more He is sort of animal COOK,
and his special business is the personal manage
rnent of wild animal tours He receives them
lions tigers leopards elephants, everything else
at Hamburg where they have been brought
fresh from their native wilds and not only super
intends their shipment aboard vessel bound for
New York but he sails with them to make sure
that they arrive safely and in good health. And
be sure that if the tiger gets Off his diet and
needs nice fresh live rabbit to tone up his sys-
tenn, this man will be aware Of the fact almost
before the tiger is-and, ergo nice big jumping
bunny is sacrificed in accordance with the pre-
cepts OF wild beast matera medica. Then, too,
one can never tell just when the big boa is go
ing to rouse from his last gorge; when he does
he wants toothsome young goat, and he wants
it quick 1t is a part of the animal mans duties
to anticipate the boas appetite with all possible
expedition.
He is a quiet, unassuming man, with stoop
shoulders and bushy whiskers and he leads the
way to the tween decks without word. Per-
haps the uninitiated may believe that a tour
through the animal section of freight-carrylng
vessel is an unimpressive experience. Well, let
them trv it and see This be said at the out
set-it is somewhat different from a menager1e.
It means something to come into close proximity
to a hundred and odd wild animals that have been
ruthIessly snatched from their lairs in Africa or
Asia or elsewhere, and clapped into little barred
boxes, NOT as large as dry goods cases; slammed
in and out of dark holes in the vessels of several
seas on the way to Hamburg; then finally placed
in the stygian tween decks of a German hooker.
The swinging cross seas Of the North Atlantic
have not improved their tempers, their nerv-
ous systems, and the visitor at Quarantine is
quickly impressed with that fact The hOWls and
wines and the barks cease abruptly as the stran-
gers enter For they bring the smell of land, and
the great beasts sniff inquiringly, and hungrily,
too
The cages lined both sides Of the gloomy space,
with little passageway between the boxes Per-
haps this passageway was three feet wide, not
more The cages piled two and sometimes
three deep. In the bottom cage, for instance,
would be a tiger; in the next above smaller ami
NAL say, a leopard or lynx and above that a
parrot or a bunch Of neerkats. Think Of it! A
three-foot passageway, with ferOciOus animals,
stretching along for 100 feet on all sides. Talk
about nightmares The reporters hair stifened
ont like so many pieces of wire, and he wished
most fervently that he had not come. 1t was more
agreeable he felt, to see these animals in a me-
ragerie where the cages are ample and the bars
an inch thick.
Better keep in the middle of the AISLE" says
one of the animal men; these fellows sometimes
reach out for you.
Words such as these. of course, hardly tended
to reassure.
1t really too dark to see much. One
caught view of the cages stretching away In
gloomy perspective until lost in the, darkness, OF