30 BEASTS AND MEN 
I thought the public might, perhaps, have had enough of 
ethnology for the time being, and I therefore set to work to 
devise some new form of entertainment. The result of 
my meditations was a revolution in the methods of training 
wild beasts for the circus. For many years, indeed ever 
since I could remem- 
ber, I had been greatly 
distressed at. the cruel 
methods of teaching ani- 
mals to perform, which 
were then in vogue. My 
enthusiasm for my own 
calling originated more, 
if I may say so, in a love 
for all living creatures 
than in any mere com- 
mercial instincts. I had 
no doubt inherited this 
passion from my father, 
and under the circum- 
stances in which I found 
, myself there was, of 
Patagomati course, every opportun- 
ity of cultivating the taste. I do not intend toimply that I have 
not also had an eye to the main chance; but I can, I think, 
say with perfect truth that I am, and always have been, a 
naturalist first and a trader afterwards. This being the case, 
it was only natural that I, in common | am sure with all 
other lovers of animals, should be greatly distressed at the 
wicked ill-treatment to which “tamed” beasts were in those 
days subjected. In a later chapter I shall relate some tales 
about this barbarous method of training—now happily a thing 
of the past—and I will only say here that the poor brutes were 
driven to perform their “tricks” by being thrashed with 
whips and burned with red-hot irons. 
For many years I had been pondering over this subject, 
