538 WILD ANIMALS. 



he preferred to carry the pencil to his mouth, and swallowed about 

 an inch of the best Cumberland lead. Professor Owen, who de- 

 scribed the gorilla in 1848, Professor Mivart, and other gentle- 

 men and ladies were among his visitors on Saturday. When 

 he obtained a hat, which he acquired by the easy process of putting 

 out his hand and taking the first one he found, he drummed upon 

 it with great apparent satisfaction, but then began to crush it in 

 from the crown. At this stage the owner intervened, and with 

 the assistance of the German keeper got his property out of the 

 young gorilla's powerful grasp. Pongo drank half a glass of beer 

 in the presence of the audience, and also ate some roast beef and 

 potatoes, but ordinarily he lives chiefly on vegetables, and makes 

 enormous meals of them. In the morning they give him milk 

 and fruits, cherries, currants, raspberries, etc. At mid-day he has 

 a basin of boiled rice, and anything else that he can get. In the 

 course of the afternoon he has more fruit, and perhaps some 

 eau sucrh or wine and water. In the evening more milk is 

 brought, and this, with bread and butter and eggs, completes his 

 supper. He goes to bed at eight, and sleeps as late as eight the 

 next morning. It must be remembered he is very young. But 

 he has learnt to smoke — at least, when the cigarette has an amber 

 mouthpiece, for he does not Hke the taste of tobacco. He puffs 

 out the clouds of blue smoke from his wide nostrils. Two hundred 

 thousand people are said to have visited him in Berlin since June 

 28th, 1876, and he has grown in that period taller by more than 

 three inches, and heavier by eleven pounds. As he has so early 

 learnt both to smoke and drink, it is hoped that he may soon 

 acquire the other accomplishments which distinguish civilization." 

 This attractive little beast, however, did not live long enough 

 to enable his owners to study the change in its disposition and 

 habits that undoubtedly takes place on the gorilla's arrrival at 

 maturity, for on being taken back to Berlin he died suddenly. A 

 post-mortem examination disclosed the fact that he had succumbed 

 to an attack of acute inflammation of the bowels, the same disease 

 which carries off" so many young children. A reproduction of the 

 photograph of the little animal, which was courteously supplied by 

 the director of the Berlin Aquarium, will be found on page 536. 



