158 ELEPHANT LIFE IN ENGLAND 
the vendor is anxious to dwell. “ Sold for no fault, 
but solely because the owner is giving up hunting,” 
is the favourite formula at Tattersall’s ; and an ele- 
phant which is leaving a zoological garden to appear 
in a monster circus might be supposed to be dis- 
qualified for service in the latter, if it possessed any 
vice which made it an undesirable inmate of the 
former. The inference is more apparent than real ; 
for the harder work and exercise at Barnum’s could 
hardly fail to make a change in the impressionable 
elephant temperament. But a pleasing mystery 
surrounded the “ deal.” The shrewd sense of Barnum 
himself nursed the growing excitement on both sides 
of the Atlantic with a genial dexterity which will 
ever be considered a masterpieee of management 
among the illustrious exhibitors of the future. The 
Society, on their side, kept their own counsel, and 
the sale of the big elephant was briefly alluded to 
in the report as “ made for satisfactory reasons given 
by the responsible executive.” Neither did the price 
received figure as a separate item in the receipts. 
But as the amount credited to u Garden sales ” ex- 
ceeded that of the previous year by about ^1800, 
we may assume that the sum paid by Mr. Barnum 
was well within that limit. A good authority informs 
the writer that the net payment was ^1000. Mean- 
time the “ Jumbo boom” was immensely profitable 
to the Society’s revenue. The fees paid for admission 
to the Gardens rose by ^§5500 in the year, an in- 
crease which the Secretary’s report attributes to the 
