THE GIRAFFE'S OBITUARY 
39 
with the complete interruption of the ancient trade in 
wild animals up the Valley of the Nile by the Mahdi’s 
occupation of the Soudan, a trade as old as the days 
of Solomon, never organized, often interrupted for 
centuries, yet always ready to spring up again, and 
always dependent for its rarest products on the free 
navigation of the river of Egypt. Giraffes — which, 
not excepting the hippopotamus, have most excited 
the imagination of European capitals after the long 
intervals in which they have remained unseen by the 
nations of the West — seem always to have found their 
way hither from the land of the Pharaohs. The first 
seen in Europe since the “ tertiary epoch ” was 
obtained from Alexandria by Julius Caesar, and 
exhibited at the Circensian Games to crowds who 
expected, from its name, “ camelopard,” to find in it a 
combination of the size of a camel and the ferocity 
of a panther. Pliny, who described it, echoed the 
public disappointment. “ It was as quiet,” he wrote, 
‘as a sheep.” The trade probably reached its maxi- 
mum after it became the fashion to exhibit combats 
of wild beasts at Rome ; yet even then giraffes seem 
to have been scarce in the popular shows, though 
Pompey could exhibit five hundred lions at a time, 
and the Emperor Titus, at the dedication of his new 
theatre, caused the slaughter of five thousand wild 
beasts. Either the number of wild animals in the 
provinces must have been beyond anything since 
known, or the Roman Governors must have used 
their despotic powers freely to oblige their friends. 
