THE LION HOUSE AT THE ZOO 
69 
Asian railway to the Black Sea, and thence to England, 
was no easy matter. In the first place, the railway 
officials objected that tigers were not scheduled in their 
bill of charges, and unlike the English station-master, 
who held that cats is dogs, and rabbits is dogs, and 
parrots is dogs, maintained that tigers were tigers, and 
ought to be paid for at exceptional rates, including, of 
course, a bribe to the officials. This view being dis- 
puted by the tiger’s owner, it remained at the station, 
where, being not only quite tame, but an adept at 
small tricks, it became a general favourite. Its great 
performance was that of raising a basin of water and 
pouring it over its head ; and this accomplishment, 
displayed before the daughter of the superintendent of 
the line, ultimately secured the tiger a passage to the 
sea. At Poti it was shipped for Constantinople, being 
supplied with a small flock of sheep as food in case 
the voyage was protracted. The animal remembered 
and recognized his first purchaser long after it had 
found a resting-place at the Zoo, though not at so long 
an interval as that after which the lion in the Tower 
showed its affection for its old keeper. This lion, 
which a certain Mr. Archer, employed at the Court of 
Morocco, “ had brought up like a puppy-dog, having 
it to lie on his bed, until he grew as great as a mastiff, 
and no dog could be more gentle to those he knew/’ 
was sent to the Tower, where, after an interval of seven 
years, he recognized one John Bull, a servant of his 
master, who, according to Captain John Smith, “ went 
with divers of his friends to see the lions, not knowing 
