Part 12

A few steps take us to the magnificent aviary, 170 feet in length, constructed in 1851, through the nineteen divisions of which a pure stream of water is constantly flowing, and the space enclosed by iron netting is so spacious that the birds have room freely to use their wings. The first compartment contains two of the rarities of the gardens--the satin bower-bird and the Tallagulla or brush-turkey. The former, a bird of a shining blue-black colour, is the only remaining one of three brought to this country in 1849. Immediately upon their arriving in the gardens they commenced the construction of one of their bowers or "runs," which, according to the secretary, has been constantly added to and re-arranged from that period to the present time. The bower is, perhaps, one of the most extraordinary things in bird-architecture, as it is constructed not for the useful purpose of containing the young, but purely as a playing-place--a decorated ball-room, in fact, wherein the young couple flirt and make love previous to entering upon connubial life. The bower is constructed, in the present instance, from the twigs of an old besom, in the shape of a horse-shoe; or perhaps we should convey a better idea of it by stating that the sticks are bent into a shape like the ribs of a man-of-war, the top being open, and the length varying from six to twelve inches. Against the sides, and at the entrance of the bower, the bird, in a state of nature, places bright feathers, snail-shells, bleached bones--anything, in fact, containing colour. When it is remembered that Australia is the very paradise of parrots and gaudy-plumaged birds, it will be seen that the little artist cannot lack materials to satisfy his taste for ornament; nevertheless, we are told he goes for a considerable distance for some of his decorations. When the structure is completed, he sits in it to entice the female, fully aware, no doubt, that the fair are attracted by a handsome establishment. Be that as it may, the couple speedily commence running in and out of it, with as much sense, and probably with as much enjoyment, as light-heeled bipeds perform a galop. The consequence, however, of the male bird being bereft of his companions, he seems careless of his bower, which is in a most forlorn condition--a ball-room, in fact, a day after a _fête_. May a new companion speedily arrive and induce him to put his house once more in order! The satin bower-bird, like the magpie, is well-known by the natives to be a terrible thief; and they always search his abode for any object they may have lost. "I myself," says Mr. Gould, in his account of these birds, "found at the entrance of one of them a small neatly-worked stone tomahawk of an inch and a half in length, together with some slips of blue cotton rags, which the birds had, doubtless, picked up at a deserted encampment of the natives."

Scarcely a less interesting bird is the brush-turkey. In appearance it is very like the common black turkey, but is not quite so large; the extraordinary manner in which its eggs are hatched constitutes its singularity. It makes no nest, in the usual acceptation of the term, but scratches decayed vegetable matter into a pyramid with its feet. It then carefully dibbles in its eggs at regular intervals, with the small end downward, and covers them over with the warm fermenting gatherings. The pair in the gardens, shortly after they were received from Australia, commenced making one of these hatching-mounds, which, by the time it was finished, contained upwards of four cart-loads of leaves and other vegetable matter. After the female had deposited sixteen eggs, each measuring not less than four inches in length--an enormous size, considering the bulk of the bird--the male began to keep watch over this natural Eccaleobion, and every now and then scratched away the rubbish to inspect them. After six weeks of burial, the eggs, in succession, and without any warning, gave up their chicks--not feeble, but full-fledged and strong: an intelligent keeper told us that he had seen one fly up out of the ground at least five feet high. At night the chicks scraped holes for themselves, and, lying down therein, were covered over by the old birds, and thus remained until morning. The extraordinary strength of the newly-hatched bird is accounted for by the size of the shell, which contains sufficient nutriment to nourish it until it is lusty. Unfortunately, all the young but one have perished through various accidents quite independently of temperature; and the next brood will probably be reared. As both the flesh and the eggs of these birds are delicious, the council is anxious to naturalize them among us. In fact, one of the objects of the gardens, under their enlightened management, is to make it what Bacon calls in his "Atlantis," "a tryal place for beasts and fishes." For centuries a system of extermination has been adopted towards many indigenous animals; the wolf and buzzard have quite disappeared, and the eagle is fast being swept away even from the highlands of Scotland--so rapidly, indeed, that Mr. Gordon Cumming is anxious, we hear, for the formation of a society for the protection of its eggs. Noxious animals have been replaced by the acclimatization of many of the foreign fauna, which are either distinguished for their beauty or valuable for their flesh. This transfer, which adds so much to the richness of the country, can be vastly accelerated through the agency of these gardens, which are a kind of "tryal ground" for beasts, as the fields of some of our rich agriculturists are for foreign roots and grasses, in which those likely to be of service can be discovered, and afterwards distributed throughout the land.

If we may quote the brush-turkeys as instances of birds capable of affording a new kind of delicate and easily-reared food, the splendid Impegan pheasants, close at hand, bred here from a pair belonging to her Majesty, and which endure, in the open air, the rigour of winter, may be looked upon as "things of beauty," which may be produced among us to charm the eye. The elands, again, on the north side of the garden, which have bred so prolifically, and made flesh so rapidly, have been with advantage turned out into our parks, where their beautiful forms prove as attractive to the eye as their venison, of the finest quality, do to the taste.

But we can no longer tarry to speculate further on the riches of this aviary, which contains rare specimens of birds from all parts of the world. Passing along the path which takes us by the north entrance, we reach the pelicans' paddock, in which we see half a dozen of these ungainly creatures, white and grey, with pouches beneath their bills as capacious as the bag of a lady's work-table. The visitor may sometimes have an opportunity of witnessing an explanation of the popular myth that the old bird feeds its young from the blood of its own breast. This idea evidently arose from the fact that it can only empty the contents of its pouch into the mouths of its young by pressing it against its breast, in the act of doing which the feathers often became insanguined from the blood of the mangled fish within it. The close observance of birds and beasts in zoological collections has tended to reduce many fabulous tales to sober reason. On the other side of the walk may be seen in immature plumage one of the red flamingoes from South America, which are said to simulate so closely a regiment of our soldiers, as they stand in rows fishing beside the banks of rivers; and here, too, are the delicate rose-colour specimens of the Mediterranean, which are likewise exceedingly beautiful. Those accustomed to navigate the Red Sea frequently witness vast flights of these birds passing and re-passing from Arabia to Egypt; and we are informed by a traveller that on one occasion, when he had a good opportunity of measuring the column, he convinced himself that it was upwards of a mile in length! What a splendid spectacle to see the pure eastern sky barred by this moving streak of brilliant colour!

But we have not yet explored the north side of the grounds, where the huge pachydermatous animals are lodged. The difficulty caused by the carriage-drive running between the two gardens has been vanquished by means of the tunnel, the ascent from which on the opposite side, flanked as it is with graceful ferns, is one of the most charming portions of the grounds on a hot summer's day. If after passing through the subterranean passage we turn to the right, we come immediately upon the reptile-house. Unless the visitor selects his time, he will generally find little to amuse him here. The great snakes have either retired from public life under their blankets, or lie coiled upon the branches of trees in their dens. The reptiles are offered food once a week, but will not always feed at this interval. One huge python fasted the almost incredible time of twenty-two months, having probably prepared himself for his abstinence by a splendid gorge. After a fast of seven days, however, the majority of the serpents regain their appetites. Three o'clock is the feeding-time, and the reptiles which are on the look-out seem to know full well the errand of the man who enters with the basket, against the side of which they hear the fluttering wings of the feathered victims and the short stamp of the doomed rabbits. The keeper opens the door at the back of the den of the voluminous serpents on our right--for of these there is no fear,--takes off their blanket, and drops in upon the clattering pebbles a scampering rabbit, who hops from side to side, curious to inspect his new habitation; presently, satisfied, he sits on his haunches and leisurely begins to wash his face. Silently the rock-snake glides over the stones, uncurling his huge folds, which, like a cable, seem to move as though by some agency from without, looks for an instant upon his unconscious victim, and the next has seized him with his cruel jaws. His constricting folds are twisted as swiftly as a whip-lash round his shrieking prey, and for ten minutes the serpent lies still, maintaining his mortal knot until his prey is dead, when, seizing him by the ears, he draws him through his vice-like grip, crushing every bone, and elongating the body preparatory to devouring it. The boa and the rock-snake always swallow their prey head foremost. How is that fine neck and delicate head to make room for that bulky rabbit? thinks the spectator. Presently he sees the jaws gape, and slowly the reptile _draws himself over_, rather than swallows, his prey, as you draw a stocking upon your leg. The huge lump descends lower and lower beneath the speckled scales, which seem to stare with distension, and the monster coils himself up once more to digest his meal in quiet. Rabbits and pigeons form the food of the pythons in these gardens. While the smaller birds are preyed upon in the reptile-house, their big brothers, the storks in the paddock, are reciprocating the law of nature by eating snakes. As we pass to the opposite side of the serpent-room, where the venomous kinds are kept, we perceive that a more cautious arrangement is made for feeding. The door opens at the top instead of at the sides of their dens, and with good reason; for no sooner does the keeper remove with a crooked iron rod the blanket from the cobra, than the reptile springs, with inflated hood, into an S-like attitude, and darts laterally at his enemy. He seems incapable of striking well any object above or below his level: watch, for instance, that guinea-pig: again and again he dashes at it, but misses his aim; now he hits it, but only to drive the poor frightened creature with a score of flying pebbles before him: when at last he succeeds in piercing the sides of his victim, tetanic spasms immediately commence, and it dies convulsed in a few seconds. It is said by those who have watched venomous snakes, that the manner of dying exhibited by their stricken prey discloses the nature of the reptile that inflicted the poisoned wound. It is scarcely necessary to state that the popular idea that the tongue darts forth the venom is a fallacy. The poison is contained in glands which lie at the root of the fangs on either side, and, by the compression of the powerful muscles which make the head appear so broad and flat, it is forced into the fine tube which runs at the sides of the fang, and finds its exit near the point by a minute opening. The cobra at present in the collection, with its skin a glossy black and yellow, its eye black and angry, its motions agile and graceful, seems to be the very personification of India. As we watch it when ready to spring, we suddenly remember that only a film of glass stands between us and "pure death." But there is nothing to fear: the python, in the adjoining room, which weighs a hundred and twenty pounds, being incensed on his first arrival at being removed from his box, darted with all his force at a spectator. Yet the pane of glass had strength enough to bring him up, and he fell back so bruised about the head and muzzle by the collision, that he could not feed well for several months. The cobra that we see is the same that destroyed its keeper. In a fit of drunkenness, the man, against express orders, took the reptile out, and, placing its head inside his waistcoat, allowed it to glide round his body. When it had emerged from under his clothes from the other side, apparently in good humour, he squeezed its tail, when it struck him between his eyes; in twenty minutes his consciousness was gone, and in less than three hours he was dead. Before we leave this reptile-room, let us peep for a moment into the little apartment opening from the corner, where, hanging from the wall, we see all the cast-off dresses of the serpents. If the keeper will allow us to handle one of them for a moment, we shall see that it is indeed an entire suit of light-brown colour and of gauzy texture, which covered not only the body and head, but the very eyeballs of the wearer.

The Python-house on the other side of the Museum contains two enormous serpents. The adventures of one of them--the _Python reticulatus_--deserve to be written: when small enough to be placed in the pocket, he was, with a companion now no more, taken from Ceylon to Brazil by American sailors; they were then exhibited in most of the maritime towns of South America, and were publicly sold for a high price at Callao to the captain of a ship, who brought them to the gardens, and demanded £600 for the pair; fully persuaded of their enormous value, he had paid £30 to insure them on the voyage, and it was not until he had long and painfully cogitated that he agreed to sell them for £40. We have before referred to the extraordinary length of time a python has been known to fast without injury. Their fancies as well as their fastings are rather eccentric. Every one has heard of the snake which swallowed his blanket, a meal which ultimately killed him. A python who had lived for years in a friendly manner with a brother nearly as large as himself, was found one morning solus. As the cage was secure, the keepers were puzzled to know how the serpent had escaped: at last it was observed that the remaining inmate had swollen remarkably during the night, when the horrid fact became plain enough; the fratricide had succeeded in swallowing the entire person of his brother; it was his last meal, however, for in some months he died. A friend informs us that he once saw in these gardens a rat-snake of Ceylon devour a common _Coluber natrix_. The rat-snake, however, had not taken the measure of his victim, as by no effort could he dispose of the last four inches of his tail, which stuck out rather jauntily from the side of his mouth, with very much the look of a cigar. After a quarter of an hour, the tail began to exhibit a retrograde motion, and the swallowed snake was disgorged, nothing the worse for his living sepulchre, with the exception of the wound made by his partner when first he seized him. The ant-eater, who lately inhabited the room leading out of the python apartment, has died of a want of ants.

As we issue again into the open air, we have before us the whole length of the avenue, arched with lime-trees, in summer a veritable isle of verdure. What a charming picture it used to be to see the docile elephant pacing towards us with ponderous and majestic steps, whilst, in the scarlet howdha, happy children swayed from side to side as she marched. She, who was our delight for so many years, died some time since of a storm of thunder and lightning. Such indeed was what may seem at first the singular verdict of the medical man who made his _post mortem_. The terror, however, inspired by the storm appears to have produced some nervous disease, under which she succumbed. There is a suspicion that the carcase, five thousand pounds and upwards in weight, which was disposed of to the nackers, ultimately found its way to the sausage-makers. Do not start, good reader; elephant's flesh is considered excellent eating by the tribes of South Africa, and the lion-slayer tells us that the feet are a true delicacy. He used to eat them as we do Stilton cheese, scooping out the interior and leaving the rind; he exhibited to his audience some of these relics, which looked like huge leather fire-buckets. And now we have only the young animal left, that once sucked his huge mother, to the delight of the crowd of children, and to the disgust of the rhinoceros, who is the sworn enemy to all elephants. The little one is growing apace, however, and has already been promoted to carry the long-deserted howdha. The rhinoceros, close at hand, is the successor of the fine old fellow purchased in 1836 for 1,050_l._, the largest sum ever given by the society for a single animal. The specimen now in the gardens cost only 350_l._ in 1850, so much do these commodities fluctuate in value. His predecessor, who departed this life full of years, was constantly forced upon his belly by a pugnacious elephant, who pressed his tusks upon the back of his neighbour when he came near the palings which separated their inclosures. This rough treatment appears to have led to his death, as Professor Owen found, on dissecting the massive brute, which weighed upwards of two tons, that the seventh rib had been fractured at the bend near the vertebral end, and had wounded the left lung.

Not far from the picturesque house built by Decimus Burton, in one of the cages fronting the office of the superintendent of the gardens, is to be seen a beaver. The wonderful instinct of this little animal is certainly not inferior to that of the huge elephant. As yet he has not been placed in circumstances to enable the public to witness his building capacities; but it is the intention, we understand, of the Council to give him a stream of running water and the requisite materials to construct one of those extraordinary dams for which this animal is so famous. In Canada, where he used to flourish, the backwoodsmen often came upon hill-sides completely cleared of good-sized trees by colonies of these little creatures, who employed the felled timber to construct their dams--dams, not of a few feet in length, but sometimes of a hundred and fifty feet, built according to the best engineering formula for resisting the pressure of water, namely, in an angle with its apex pointed up the stream, and gradually narrowing from base to summit. In short, Mr. Brunel himself could not outdo your beaver in his engineering operations. Even in confinement this sagacious Rodent loves to display his skill, as we may learn from Mr. Broderip's account of his pet Binney:--

"Its building instinct," says that accomplished naturalist, "showed itself immediately it was let out of its cage, and materials were placed in its way, and this before it had been a week in its new quarters. Its strength, even before it was half-grown, was great, it would drag along a large sweeping-brush, or a warming-pan, grasping the handle with its teeth, so that the load came over its shoulder, and advancing in an oblique direction till it arrived at the part where it wished to place it. The long and large materials were always taken first; and two of the longest were generally laid crosswise, with one of the ends of each touching the wall, and their other ends projecting out into the room. The area caused by the cross-brushes and the wall he would fill up with hand-brushes, rush baskets, books, boots, sticks, cloths, dried turf, or anything portable. As the work grew high, he supported himself on his tail, which propped him up admirably; and he would often, after laying on one of his building materials, sit up over against it, appearing to consider his work, or, as the country people say, 'judge it.' This pause was sometimes followed by changing the position of the materials, and sometimes they were left in their place. After he had piled up his materials in one part of the room (for he generally chose the same place), he proceeded to wall up the space between the feet of a chest of drawers which stood at a little distance from it, high enough on its legs to make the bottom a roof for him, using for this purpose dried turf and sticks, which he laid very even, and filling up the interstices with bits of coal, hay, cloth, or anything he could pick up; the last place he seemed to appropriate for his dwelling, the former work seemed to be intended for a dam. When he had walled up the space between the feet of the chest of drawers, he proceeded to carry in sticks, cloths, hay, cotton, and to make a nest; and when he had done, he would sit up under the drawers, and comb himself with the nails of his hind feet."