MENAGERIES. 5 



in Europe, from this date to the expiration of the fifteenth cen- 

 tury, for studying the nature and habits of the living animals 

 was no doubt the reason that the science made but little if 

 any progress during that period, until, in fact, Louis XIV. 

 founded at Versailles the first establishment of modern days, 

 which became the school for Buffon and Daubenton. This 

 example was followed by other European Powers, but most of 

 the collections were small and of but little more scientific 

 interest than the collections that used to be made for hunting 

 purposes by the rulers of previous epochs. At the present day, 

 however, the Continent has several very fine zoological gardens, 

 notably those of Amsterdam, Antwerp, and Paris. The Parisians 

 discovered that one of the uses to which they could put a mena- 

 gerie was the supply of food, and the collection in the Jardin des 

 Plantes was nearly destroyed for some time, by the Parisians 

 having eaten up the animals during the siege of their city. 



In England the first royal menagerie was at "Woodstock. It 

 was at his manor there that Henry I. established it. " He walled the 

 Park round," we learn, " with stone, seven miles in circumference, 

 laying waste much fertile land and destroying many villages, 

 churches, and chapels," and in the words of the old chronicle, 

 "he appointed therein, besides a great store of deer, divers 

 strange beasts to be kept and nourished, such as were brought to 

 him from far countries, as lions, leopards, linxes, porpentines, 

 and such other," with all of which he used to amuse his ladies 

 and courtiers. 



During the reign of Henry III., in 1235, his new brother- 

 in-law, the Emperor Frederick II., having sent over three leopards, 

 in allusion to the three leopards which then adorned the royal 

 shield of England, but which were subsequently exchanged for 

 lions, as, strange to. say, were also their living representatives, 

 and these being foUowed by a camel from the same source, the 

 whole of the wild beasts were removed from Woodstock to the 

 Tower, and formed the beginning of the menagerie which existed 

 there till its transferrence to the Zoological Gardens in 1834. 



The "National Kecords" contain many orders issued to the 

 sheriffs of London, Buckinghamshire, and Bedfordshire, to 



