FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT 119 



"This freedom is the expression of the men who make and 

 manage the Bronx. They are men especially skilled in what we 

 call field observation. They have learned the love and knowl- 

 edge of animals in forest and by river. They have travelled far. 

 The manager of the birds is now setting off to China and Japan to 

 study the life of pheasants in the cradle of their race. Professor 

 Hornaday himself is the protagonist of bird and beast protection 

 throughout the world, and a hunter hardly less than a keeper. 

 In short, you have at the Bronx the ideal of every 'zoo,' the as- 

 sociation of the field observer and the scientific naturalist, who, 

 together, have created a 'zoo' where animals live a life that is far 

 removed from the caged or stuffed life of the animals kept in 

 other capitals — in Berlin, or Paris, or to some degree in London. 



"A million and more people visit the Bronx because they are 

 admitted free, and a national 'zoo' should be as free as a national 

 gallery. The Bronx is supreme because of its space and contour. 

 We cannot rival these qualities in Regent's Park, but we could 

 make room by getting rid of the worst sufferers. The keeper of 

 the birds at the Bronx desires to exclude altogether the tribe of 

 eagles and vultures, even from the spacious Bronx.* If we were 

 boldly to dispense with those unhappy and, caged as they are, 

 unkempt creatures, we could give the space on which their health 

 depends to many wild beasts whose caged patrol is at present 

 almost as painful to the observer as to the animal itself." 



We conclude our brief and sketchy retrospect of the past 

 eleven years with a feeling of profound thankfulness for the 

 combination of fortuitous circumstances that have made possi- 

 ble the creation of the New York Zoological Park in twelve years' 

 time. We say twelve years, because we know the far-reaching 

 influence of the two years of careful, painstaking and also costly 

 preliminary work that was done by this Society before the first 

 sod was lifted in the Park itself. The thousands of dollars ex- 

 pended on the final plans were well invested ; for they gave us a 

 large measure of our success. 



The public should be thankful to the members of the Execu- 

 tive Committee for the years of diligent toil they have bestowed 

 upon this undertaking, and for the success that is due chiefly 



*This rejDresents a slight misunderstanding. Plans for a spacious and ade- 

 quate Eagles and Vultures Aviary are now practically complete, and the Society 

 expects to develop that much needed installation during the year 1910. — Efl. 



