Photographing in the Zoos 291 



I regret to say that the last have already been 

 somewhat overdone in the so-called " pictorial " 

 efforts which are foisted upon an unsuspecting 

 and overgenerous public by some of our "artist 

 photographers." Good photographs of them are, 

 however, not so common. 



I have made this chapter a comparatively short 

 one, for many of my readers may think that it 

 does not rightly belong in a book which treats 

 of the photography of nature. Their idea is an 

 entirely erroneous one, however, for a photograph 

 of any animal, whether it be wild or tame, show- 

 ing it in any natural and characteristic attitude, is 

 of value, and our familiarity with the subjects 

 should not lead us into contempt for them from a 

 photographic standpoint. I am, if anything, a 

 nature photographer, doing that to the almost 

 exclusion of other work, and yet I do not consider 

 it beneath my dignity to photograph the domestic 

 animals, and I can find great pleasure and profit 

 from a day spent with my camera in the Zoo. If 

 many of the men who would enter nature work 

 would first try themselves out, so to speak, on the 

 animals that are comparatively easy to photograph, 

 they would find themselves better fitted for the 

 work which they have before them. 



