THE NATIONAL Zoo AT WASHINGTON. 713 



Another microcosm, and even more picturesque than that for the 

 coons, is the one planned for the mountain sheep, but still delayed for 

 lack of means. Mr. Langley proposes to Inclose a tract of several 

 acres of rocky, hilly land, more or less covered with timber, and 

 therein to establish a miniature of the Rocky Mountains, where the 

 bighorn sheep and his neighbors, the calling hare and the mountain 

 marmot, may live together and show us how they used to live at home. 



There are many obscure problems of life history and environment 

 that might demonstrate themselves in an inclosure of this sort. To 

 illustrate the complexity of such questions: The presence of the peli- 

 cans on Pelican Island, Yellowstone Lake, is declared by authority to 

 be essential to the life of the parasites that infest the trout of the same 

 waters, since at one stage the parasite lives in the bird. This case is 

 of a type that is common. No man can say now whether or not the 

 general failure in other zoos to preserve the mountain sheep in con- 

 finement is due to the need for any one element of its native environ- 

 ment, but the way to find out is by restoring the proper surroundings, 

 animate as well as inanimate, as far as possible. Experiments of this 

 sort must increase our knowledge of the laws of life, and in time will 

 solve the problem of successful^ maintaining our mountain sheep in 

 captivity. 



For the bears also is planned a roomy park with restored environ- 

 ment. Bears are restless, roving animals, much more so than deer, or 

 indeed than most of our large quadrupeds, and they suffer propor- 

 tionately when shut up. Many carnivorous animals breed in captivity, 

 but bears are among those that do not, not more than two or three 

 cases being on record. This is an evidence of the great pathological 

 disturbance from caging in the ordinary way. The added feature of 

 a geological disturbance in the small bear pen near the south entrance 

 resulted in a little ripple of excitement some years ago. A heavy rain 

 storm during the night washed down from the cliff into the unfinished 

 pen such a pile of rocks and sand thata young grizzly mount ingon it was 

 enabled to climb up and escape into the open. He hid himself in the 

 thickest shrubbery of the park and for a day or two eluded recapture, 

 to the consternation of numerous mothers whose children going to school 

 had to pass near the park. Each one, of course, could in imagination 

 see her own particular offspring suffering the fate of the naughty 

 children who scoffed at the baldheaded prophet. But those who saw 

 the grizzly during his brief spell of liberty say that he was s<> over- 

 whelmed by the novelty of his situation that he was quite the most 

 timorous of all concerned in the affair. 



The buffalo was one of the American animals chiefly in view \\ lien 

 the idea of the park occurred to Mr Langley. The present herd is a 

 fine one, but the amount of ground available for them is not sufficient 

 for ideal conditions. 



