Читать книгу Life at the Zoo: Notes and Traditions of the Regent's Park Gardens онлайн

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“Ars longa, vita brevis,” is, perhaps, a saying which would appeal to the hungry lions equally with the artistic visitors to the Zoo, as feeding-time approaches. At two o’clock p.m., the animals awake, stretch themselves, and yawn, showing the width of their enormous jaws, and rows of gleaming teeth. The public grows interested, and the artists desponding. Even the little lad in knickerbockers, the work on whose easel suggests the story of Michael Angelo’s first essay in sculpture, drops his brushes and runs to the steps at the back to watch his sitters in action. Then follows the mauvais quart d’heure before dinner,—in this case unduly protracted. All the beautiful lithe creatures, pacing ceaselessly to and fro, noiseless as ghosts, seem to be performing a kind of “grand chain,” which becomes faster and faster as their impatience and hunger increase. As the howling of the wolves in their distant cages is heard by the lions, excitement breaks beyond control, and the roars of the hungry beasts only cease as the truck of food is emptied. As a spectacle, the sight has a certain interest. But except for those whose imagination can picture no other side of animal life in daily contact with man, it is, perhaps, the worst moment to select in order to appreciate the real character of those most friendly beasts, the lions and tigers at the Zoo. In the early morning hours, when their “sitting-rooms” have been duly swept and strewn with fresh sawdust, and their toilet—which is always completed in their sleeping-chambers—is finished, the iron doors are opened, and the owners of the different cages come leisurely out to greet the day, each in its humour as the night’s sleep or natural temper dictates.