NATURAL HISTORY NOTES

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2510, 10 July 1915, Page 14

NATURAL HISTORY NOTES

THE ZOO

; '.-•AND THE NEWTOWN MUSEUM (By Johu Castle,' lion. secretary of the Wellington Zoological Society.) .Twenty-one hundred interesting exhibits! Where? Why, at Newtown or c So.uth Wellington. Any lover of NaHuro may, on payment of threepence, or any father and mother with a family of children under fifteen years of age, may for sixpence, any day, see, in •tho .Wellington Zoo, one thousand living, .'healthy, happy, interesting. animals. Talk about beauty! Well there is a splendid peacock from the Indian wild. In summer that bird baffles description, and we hardly 'know which' to' admire most, tho wonderful mechanism by which he expands 'his magnificent fan, the exquisite fit of his amazing plumage, or the wealth, variety, and perfect beauty of hue and tint, and shade, that make him the cynosure of all artistic eyes and admirers of' natural ' blended splendours. Just now the peacock is moulting, and, claiming no attention, modestly mopes in mufti. But- there are ill'the Zoo four. Mandarin drakes that could never be described •by,-literary genius, glowing..poet, .eloquent orator, or grandiloquent elocutionist. Aye, and there is a pheasant there, a crossbred.between a Lady. Amherst and a golden, a bird to be watched and wondered admired and dreamed about, but not to be described. Any_ person 'who would see the possibilities of perfection, of .pattern and gloss and sheen, should watch the effects of light and shade on the'plumage of that pheasant. Even now, in the depth' of winter, there are : in tho Zoo birdsand fish and mammals that we could ,no better. describe with words than, we could paint a rainbow, or French-polish a lily. Who could de'Kcribe the. rainbow, trout, or the; Japanese fantail goldfish, or tho Axis deer, or the blackbuck, or the. leopards? Then the lions 'are .as majestic and variable as the leopards are. beautiful'.i Aye, jiiid ,the monkeys are as problematic,as the lions .are powerful. In fact, I reckon that there- aro at least even now in this dull -winter season ten hundred interesting .exhibits in the/ Wellington Zoo; ■ Yes, and on a recent fine. Saturday';, afternoon .between four and five o'clock hundreds, ; probably thousands, of birds from outside, - feeling what a delightful sanctuary the grounds of the Zoo arc, settled in the tops of-the big fir-trees, and, before going to i sleep, joined i in concert with the Zoo birds and while filling wondering minds 4 with the amazing versatility. of their infinite creator, melodised in an undertone: of .ineffable ' sweetness ail ■exquisite. - impriviso of praise to John P. Lute; and George Frost,' and all tho other ■ member of .'the Reserves Committee of the Wellington City Council, who are. I .''makiiig.. the. - Newtown Park: the most glorious resemblance'to the Garden . of. Eden that most ~New Zealand boys liavo ever been privileged to meander/.muse,' and worship l in. i. But' where-are my twenty-one hundred interesting exhibits? Starlings, sparrows, and thrushes among the evergreenery of the fir trees, are not exactly e-xliibits. Well, I ,I'uckon that there aro about cloven hundred interesting things in the Newtown. Museum...

From Humming-Birds to Eagles;

Some persons, see in t-lio Newtown Museum just a damaged lion's skin and % fow -animals', that,' .having, died in distress or pain, or perhaps wasting disease of somo kind, do not .show up in perfect symmetry or pose according to nio. questionable ideas that some oritics smv<y-of zoological, proportional, and propriety. How cynical their, eyes must be? How ungrateful their, hearts? How dull, if not dead, their souls? But what is there ! in H lO Museum -thati- the eye of the .average citizen: could see; and tno mind of the man of common-sense could contemplate, and tho soul of the child ■undinimcd by jealousy, prejudice, or parsimony, could perceive and delight ™ r ,' i'here' .are humming-birds, there are eagles. ' One writer says: "1 he humming-bird has'indeed been universally/beloved arid admired by every lover of Nature."-■. Another wrote: • ■

How glad the heart of Eve would bo, „In .Eden's"-glorious, bowers,. , When she.saw the first humming-bird , Among the spicy. flowers'.

But'.what iS' this good of God creating humming-birds for the delectation ox His worshippers, or of -Nature producing.; humming-birds to gratify tne eye .and heart of its highest product, or of Alary Howitt writing glowing poetry about humming-birds, or of a publicspirited citizen procuring at a 1 great ,cost gems of creation and presouting them to Wellington City to iiold them' iii trust for the edification of tho l people of New Zealand,, if a committee will keep the doors of our museum closed .at all: hours'except a few hours of the afternoons of some days in each week, .iiul when asked about it simply .say:. "It'is a question of £ s. d., gentlemen'.' ? Is it not time for the people of New Zealand to say: ."Take the shadows of your £ : 's;-d. ofi from the ' huminingbirds;:';arid move.' yourselves out of tfie light,, that the' people may-see the giories; of the, Newtown Museum/. Yet parhaps'some people 'prefer bigger birds to-the very little'-beauties. ' .Well, in the Newtown: Museum there are representations of the' golden eagle. ' Are there'- not Irishmen and Scotsmen enough in Wellington to movo the. Wei. lhi«ton City Council to. keep our museum open during reasonable, hours'that our children may see. the crowning glory of the avi-fauna of our ;native lands ?. There'are also good specimens of the' great wedge-tailed' eagle' of Australia, said to' be • the largest eaglo in the world. There are fine specimens of' the magnificent albatross ''also, among them the Royal albatross, the great wandering albatross, and the I'ooty albatross. Shall these illustrations' of wonderful muscular development be kept bidden during most of tho week? Then we have the wonderful pelican, the' remarkable Toucan, the alert and powerful puma, or American lion, tho Arctic fox, the armadillo, the porcupine, tho platypus, the echidna, the bat, the alligator, and the Emperor penguin. When the Queen of England' had left for a while the splendours of palaces, and moved out to enjoy tho sylvan beauty of Regent Park, and inspect tho marvellous microcosm of the London Zoo, the wonder that held her attention longest was the Emperor-'pen-guin. . An enterprising, public-spirited citizen obtained a fine specimen of the Emperor penguin, and placed it in our museum, but when • visitors from the country .coino to Wellington on public holdays, or when AVellington men, aftor the toils of tho day, .want something to elevato their minds, and refresh their tired intellects, birds, beautiful enough to fascinate the eyes of queens and move kings to healthy contemplation, are locked up in the Newtown Musoum behind a screen 011 which in great big letters is the ominous sign "Closed."' Then thero aro the scarlet ibis and tho Now Zealand pigeon, and the muchlamented liuia. Yes, and there is the Amherst pheasant, and near it is the crimson-winged parakeet, one of the most, beautiful,, products of Nature. Ayo, and I 'might mention many other interesting things, but time and the limits of space forbid. Not one-of the spocios mentioned ill this paragraph is ropresontcd in our Zoo. And, besides those that I have mentioned the names of there aro several other beautiful thines. that are'not represented in' thai

Zoo. 1 think it may safely bp said, then, that if wo count the animals in the Zoo and tho animals that are not in the Zoo. but are represented in tlio museum, and the animals represented in both Zoo and museum, there aro in Nowtown upwards of twenty-one hundred good natural history illustrations which ought to be oh vioiv, at all reasonable times, for the pleasure and' edification of all residents and sojourners in tho capital of Now Zealand. Wanted, then, ten thousand darknesstlispellors to shift tlio shadows of the Museum Committco from the glories of the Nowto\hi Museum. The Sasin Antelope. 9I LLi : P! BS sut[ oSpnt (tusjaclraoa y black-buck or Sasin antelope (Antilope corvicapra) is ono of the handsomest of the smaller antelopes." There have long been a pair of tlieso beautiful little animals ill our Zoo. The male broke its horn before I had tho pleasure of seeing him, and the • female is slightly deformed in ono jaw. Recently a young male has been imported, and this one promises •to become a perfect representative of his species. Of course, at present lie is not coloured as ho will be. but he is radiant with promjse. The Zoo steadily improves.