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Dr. E. Hopkinson,



windows very few. and placed in such a manner as to prevent the captives from

seeing the fields, the woods, the birds fluttering at liberty, or whatever might

awake their sensibility, and disturb the calm so conducive to corpulence. A

little glimmering was sufficient to direct them to their food, which consisted of

millet and a sort of paste made of figs and flour. They had also given them

the berries of thelentisk,* of the myrtle, of the ivy, and whatever, in short,

would improve the delicacy and flavour of their flesh. They were supplied with

a little stream of water, which ran in a gutter through the volerie. Twenty

days before they were intended for killing, their allowance was augmented ;

nay, so far was the attention carried, that they gently removed into a little

anti-chamber the Thrushes which were plump and in good order, to enjoy

more quiet; and, frequently, to heighten the illusion, they hung bowers and

verdure, imitating natural scenery, so that the birds might fancy themselves in

the midst of the woods. In short, they treated their slaves well, because they

knew their interest. Such as were newly caught were put in small separate

voleries, along with others which had been accustomed to confinement; and

every contrivance, every soothing art was employed to habituate them some¬

what to bondage; yet these birds were never completely tamed.”


We will now return to Russ, who writes that the first of these

bird-houses was, according to Pliny, that built by Marcus Laenius

Strabo, and goes on to say that —


since his time, authors have lamented, that the custom has grown up of

keeping in prisons animals which Nature intended to live out their lives in

freedom.”


He next introduces us to Alexander Severus, the successor of

Heliogabalus, whom he calls —


“ a noteworthy bird-fancier according to our ideas, a true animal-lover in the

best sense of the words, who kept dogs, cats and other four-footed pets, as well

as birds, the latter in great numbers, for instance his collection of Doves

numbered some 20,000 head. All his birds were most carefully kept and

tended for the sole purpose of facilitating the observation of their life-habits

and ways.”


But surely 20,000 head was rather a large number for the

purposes of study only, and one can hardly believe that Severus had

not, like his contemporaries, the kitchen and the banqueting hall in

view as the proper end, sooner or later, of his feathered captives.

Our author then continues :


“ Ancient Rome soon became for other reasons the headquarters of the

importation of live stock from all parts. For the great combats of the arena

thousands of wild beasts were brought over and this necessitated hunting and

catching expeditions to all parts of the then known world. With these vast



* The mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus), one of the resin-producing shrubs of the

Mediterranean.—E. II.



