When I make afternoon tea I make an extra portion for the 
gibbons. People here say that the tannin in tea supplies some 
element that leaf-eating monkeys ordinarily get in their food 
suu^lies in the wild, but not in captuvit]^. However, they will 
only drink it if there is plenty of sugar in it. Gibbons have 
a curious habit of drinking: instead of putting their noses into 
the pan, they lift what liquid they can in one cupped hand and 
drink out of that. Our two are very fond of Davis and Jennier, 
love to hang around their necks, but are still suspicious of Bill 
and me and won T t come to us. 
Harry and the larger gibbon are great pals, roiling over 
and over together in play. Harry also likes little Mr. Milquetoast, 
but I don 1 1 think the feeding is really reciprocated. Mr. M. 
endures the tiger 1 s caresses, but is pretty much air? id of him . 
Mrs. Coenra - d got some remarkable photographs of the gibbon and 
tiger together: they should win a prize in any Picture-of-your- 
Pet show. 
Mxyx22 There was a heavy rainstorm in the evening, and both the 
boys insisted dm going out in all the rain rnd making sure that 
none of their charges were getting wet. They were worried about 
all the specimens that we had put in outdoor paddocks, who 
perhaps would not be familiar enough with their new hones to 
get under the shelters provided. 
May 22 - 
Everything seemed to get through the night well, and be none 
the worse for the storm. 
Yesterday one of the gardeners working around the place 
brought in a very small snake in a bottle, and wanted to exchange 
it for a cigarette. Bill thought that a very modest price to set 
on his specimen, and gave him four cigarettes, which delighted 
him. This morning he "turned up with a black cobra which he 
had captured in back of our house. I suggested that probably he 
would want a cigar, but Bill paid him in money, and listened 
entranced to the lurid account he gave of the capture. The 
story was told in Malay, but accompanied with unmistakable 
pantomime. Anybody who catches a cobra alive has plenty of 
courage, and I am glad that this one is no longer wandering about 
in our back yard. < f i IlitSllli 
May 23 - 
No exciting acquisitions today, but there is always plenty of 
amusement watching the babies perform in the back j^rrd. The friendly 
gibbon (named by Davis Roemah Sakitl) spent the morning trying to 
pick fleas off Harry, and in afternoon played with the Himalayan 
bear cubs. The bears are ready to fight anyone else, but they were 
a little awed by Roemah Sakit, who could of course leap out of 
their way if they got too rough. 
To-day is visitors 1 day, somewhat to our annoyance. The 
natives think that this is f free zoo, and hence so ewhat better 
than the Eiantar Zoo, where the admission charge is 5 cents. They 
^ander in and out of the back yard, often going through our bedrooms 
to get there. Somebody picked up a tin of cigarettes and 20 cents 
on his way in or out. We must get more locks on the doors, and 
more signs ^Dilarang Ma soek r (No entrance). 
