58 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOGIEDRY 
THE ELEPHANT HOUSE. 
In such an institution as the Zoological Park the completion of 
the largest and finest building of an entire series is necessarily an 
important event. The elephants, rhinoceroses and hippopotam1 
are so very large, so powerful and so valuable that their proper 
housing demands the maximum effort in zoological construction. 
Our new Elephant House is not only our largest and finest animal 
building, but it also represents our ideas of perfection in such 
structures. It has not been designed to contain a large number 
of duplicate pachyderms, but rather to house a collection of the 
first magnitude, and zoologically as nearly complete as such collec- 
tions can well be made. 
We believe that this building represents high-water mark in 
zoological building construction. It is spacious, well lighted. 
beautiful in its lines, both externally and internally, beautifully 
ornamented without being overdone, and yet wholly free from 
useless extravagance. The interior lighting and cage “effects” 
are highly satisfactory, the light upon the animals being quite 
sufficient, without being too strong and glaring. It is clearly 
evident that the animals enjoy their cages; for were it otherwise, 
the Indian rhinoceros would not, almost daily, gallop round and 
round, and with ponderous agility often leap into the air. 
In our ever continuous effort to give each of our captive ani- 
mals ai option on several different conditions of light, heat and 
seclusion, we introduced low down in a side wall of each of the 
large cages, two large registers for the delivery of currents of 
warm air. The arrangement has added greatly to the personal 
comfort of the animals. If the general temperature of the build- 
ing is a little too low to suit the comfort of an elephant or rhinoc- 
eros, the animal at once seeks the currents of warm air issuing 
from the registers. By means of these warm-air registers it 1s 
possible to keep the general temperature of the building at a 
somewhat lower point than would otherwise be safe. 
The construction of the yards and fences surrounding the 
Elephant House began immediately after the erection of the build- 
ing had progressed far enough to permit the ground to be cleared 
of building materials. The work has been vigorously prosecuted 
at all points, and on January 1, 1909, was so well advanced that 
its completion is assured well in advance of weather warm enough 
to make it possibe to use them. This work will be referred to 
later on in this report. 
The only complaint that thus far has reached the Director 
regarding the use of the Elephant House is of a very novel 
