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Updated: July 7, 2025
The jungle became thicker, and although I was in the middle of the herd and within ten yards of several giraffes, I could do nothing. A mass of thick and tangled thorns now received them, and closed over the hardly-contested race I was beaten. Never mind, it was a good hunt first-rate but where was my camp?
Pa was a sight, with no shirt on, and he ought to have gone to the dressing room and slicked, but just then the camels and the giraffes, who had inhaled their snuff, began to sneeze and beg to be killed, and pa had to go over there and quiet them. A camel is the solemnist looking beast on earth when he tries to be good natured, but when he is sick and mad, and full of snuff, he is a fiend.
The menagerie, though the ostensible staple of the gardens, is rather poor and scanty; pretty well provided with lions and lionesses, also one or two giraffes, some camels, a polar bear, who plunged into a pool of water for bits of cake, and two black bears, who sat on their haunches or climbed poles; besides a wilderness of monkeys, some parrots and macaws, an ostrich, various ducks, and other animal and ornithological trumpery; some skins of snakes so well stuffed that I took them for living serpents till J discovered the deception, and an aquarium, with a good many common fishes swimming among sea-weed.
The uninhabited country exactly opposite Tomat was said to abound with large game, such as elephants, giraffes, &c. as there were no enemies to disturb them.
Their legs are so long, and their necks so short, that they cannot graze on the level ground, but, like the giraffes of Africa, are compelled to browse on the tops of tall plants, and the twigs and leaves of trees, in the summer; while in the winter they feed on the tops of the willows and small birches, and are never found far from the neighbourhood where such trees grow.
Wild animals and game are plentiful; according to Marco Polo, leopards, bears, lions, wild boars, giraffes, wild asses, roebucks, deer, stags, and cattle were to be found in great numbers; but what seemed most marvellous of all to him was the fabulous griffin, the roc, of which we hear so much in the "Thousand and one Nights," which is not, he says, "an animal, half-lion and half-bird, able to raise and carry away an elephant in its claws."
Looking eastward from the western side of the room he will observe at once that his way lies down a passage, marked on either side by formidable zoological specimens, which he would rather meet, with their present anatomy of hay, than in their natural condition. In the first room, near the giraffes, stand the walrus of the North Sea; the African rhinoceros; and the Manilla buffalo.
They had shot and otherwise killed camelopards by the score, but had not succeeded in capturing any young ones alive. Our hunters had left home with the determination to take back a pair of young giraffes, and to pay all expenses of their expedition by this, as also by the sale of hippopotamus teeth. The hope was not an unreasonable one.
Ned offered to accompany him, but Sayd was too tired after his morning march to leave the camp. Hassan and another freed man followed, carrying spare guns. It was difficult to say beforehand what game might be met with, whether elephants, or buffaloes, or giraffes, or zebras, or deer, but the hunters were prepared for any one of them.
Its banks were trampled with the hoof-marks of many giraffes, some of which were very small. They had evidently been lately made, and by the same drove they had seen three days before. From this it was evident that the flock frequented both forests. "We have seen quite enough for the present," said Willem. "Our next plan is to send for Macora's promised assistance, and construct another trap."
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