Chapter VII (1)

If there is any one exhibition that seems to possess interest to the inhabitants of the rural districts of both America and England, it is "wax works." Mrs. Jarley understood the taste of the English public in this direction, if we are to believe her celebrated chronicler. Artemus Ward commenced his career with his celebrated collection of "wax figgers;" and one of the sights of London, at the present day,--and a sight, let me assure the reader, that is well worth the seeing,--is Madame Tussaud's "exhibition of distinguished characters."

Let not the unsophisticated reader suppose that this is a collection of frightful caricatures, similar to those he has seen at travelling exhibitions or cheap shows, where one sees the same figure that has done duty as Semmes, the pirate, transformed, by change of costume, into the Duke of Wellington, or Jefferson Davis, or that it is one of those sets of figures with expressionless-looking faces, and great, staring glass eyes, dressed in cast-off theatrical wardrobes, or garments suggestive of an old-clothes shop. Nothing of the sort. Madame Tussaud's exhibition was first opened in the Palais Royal, Paris, in 1772, and in London 1802, and is the oldest exhibition of the kind known; and although the celebrated Madame is dead, her sons still keep up the exhibition, improving upon it each season, and display an imposing list of noble patrons upon their catalogue, among whom figure the names of Prince Albert, Louis XVIII., the late Duke of Wellington, &c.

The price of admission is a shilling; an additional sixpence is charged to visit the Chamber of Horrors; and a catalogue costs the visitor another sixpence, so that it is a two-shilling affair, but richly worth it. The exhibition consists of a series of rooms, in which the figures, three hundred in number, are classified and arranged. The first I sauntered into was designated the Hall of Kings, and contained fifty figures of kings and queens, from William the Conqueror to Victoria; they were all richly clad in appropriate costumes, some armed with mail and weapons, and with faces, limbs, and attitudes so artistically and strikingly natural, as to startle one by their marvellous semblance of reality; then the costumes, ornaments, and arms are exact copies of those worn at the different periods, and the catalogue asserts that the faces are carefully modelled from the best portraits and historical authorities.

Here are William the Conqueror and his Queen Matilda; here is William Rufus, with his red locks and covetous brow; here stands Richard I. (Coeur de Lion), his tall figure enclosed in shirt of chain-mail; and there sits King John, with dark frown and clinched hand, as if cursing the fate that compelled him to yield to the revolting barons, and sign Magna Charta; Edward III. and his Queen, Philippa, the latter wearing a girdle of the order of knighthood; and near at hand, Edward's noble, valiant son, the Black Prince--a magnificent figure, looking every inch a warrior, and noble gentleman. The artist had succeeded in face, costume, and attitude in representing in this work one of the most grand and chivalric-looking figures I ever looked upon, and which caused me, again and again, to turn and gaze at what appeared such an embodiment of nobleness and bravery as one might read of in poetry and romance, but never see in living person. Among others of great merit was the figure of Edward IV. in his coronation robes, who was considered the handsomest man of his time; and Richard III. in a splendid suit of armor of the period, and the face copied from an original portrait owned by the Duke of Norfolk; Henry VII. in the same splendid costume in which he figures on his monument in Westminster Abbey; and then bluff old Henry VIII., habited in a full suit of armor, as worn by him on the Field of the Cloth of Gold.

Queen Mary (Bloody Mary) in her rich costume; then comes Queen Elizabeth, dressed exactly as she is in Holbein's well-known picture at Hampton Court Palace; Charles I. in the splendid suit of chevalier armor of his time; and Oliver Cromwell in his russet boots, leather surcoat, steel gorget and breastplate, broad hat, and coarse, square features; George III. in the robes of the Order of St. Patrick; his majesty George IV. in that stunning costume of silk stockings, breeches, &c., and the robes of the Order of the Garter over it, in which he figures in the picture that we are all so familiar with.

Then we have Victoria and her whole family, a formidable group in point of numbers, very well executed figures, and clad in rich and fashionably-made costumes, some of which are veritable court dresses, which have been purchased after being cast aside by the wearers. Certainly the outfit of these figures must be a heavy expense, as is evident to the most casual observer.

So much for the hall of English sovereigns. The other statues embrace representations of other monarchs and celebrated personages. Nicholas I. of Russia's tall figure looms up in his uniform of Russian Guards; Napoleon III., Marshal St. Arnaud, and General Canrobert in their dresses of French generals; Abdul Medjid in full Turkish costume, and the Empress Eugenie in a splendid court dress.

A very fine figure of Charlemagne in full armor, equipped for battle, which was manufactured for the great exhibition of 1862, is a splendid specimen of figure-work and modern armor manufacture. Then we came to a fine figure of Wolsey in his cardinal's dress. Mrs. Siddons in the character of Queen Katherine, Macready as Coriolanus, and Charles Kean as Macbeth, are evidence that the theatrical profession is remembered, while Knox, Calvin, and Wesley indicate attention to the clergy.

The few American figures were for the most part cheaper affairs than the rest of the collection, and might be suspected, some of them, of being old ones altered to suit the times. For instance, that of General McClellan, President Lincoln and his Assassin, _George_ Wilkes Booth, as the catalogue has it, would hardly pass for likenesses.

There is a very natural, life-like-looking figure of Madame Tussaud herself, a little old lady in a large old-fashioned bonnet, looking at a couch upon which reposes a splendid figure of a Sleeping Beauty, so arranged with clock-work that the bosom rises and falls in regular pulsations, as if breathing and asleep. Madame Tussaud died in 1850, at the age of ninety years.

A very clever deception is that of an old gentleman, seated in the middle of a bench, holding a programme in his hand, and apparently studying a large group of figures. By an ingenious operation of machinery, he is made to occasionally raise his head from the paper he is so carefully perusing, and regard the group in the most natural manner possible, and afterwards resume his study. This figure is repeatedly taken by strangers to be a living person, and questions or observations are frequently addressed to it. One of my own party politely solicited the loan of the old gentleman's programme a moment, and only discovered from the wooden character of the shoulder he laid his hand on, why he was not answered. Ere long he had the satisfaction of witnessing another person ask the quiet old gentleman to "move along a bit," and repeat the request till the smothered laughter of the spectators revealed the deception.

Perhaps the most interesting part of Madame Tussaud's exhibition was the Napoleon rooms, containing an extensive collection of relics of Napoleon the Great. These relics are unquestionably authentic, and, of course, from their character, of great value. There is the camp bedstead upon which the great warrior rested during seven years of his weary exile at St. Helena, with the very mattresses and pillows upon which he died, and, in a glass case near by, the counterpane used upon the bed, and stained with his blood. This last, a relic, indeed, which the possessors might, as Mark Antony suggested of napkins dipped in dead Cæsar's wounds,

"Dying, mention it within their wills,
Bequeathing it, as a rich legacy,
Unto their issue."

This bed was purchased of Prince Lucien, Napoleon's brother, for four hundred and fifty pounds. Then, as if in mockery of human greatness, there was hung close by this death-bed the coronation robe of Napoleon, sold at the restoration of Louis XVIII., from the Cathedral of Notre Dame; also the robe of the Empress Josephine, sold at the same time. Here, upon the bed, is a wax figure of the great emperor, partially enveloped in a cloak, the identical one he wore at the battle of Marengo, and which served as a pall when he was conveyed to the grave in his rocky prison.

In the room adjoining, the principal object of interest was the military carriage of the emperor, the same one in which he made the campaign of Russia, and which was captured by the Prussians on the evening of the battle of Waterloo. Here also is the carriage used by him during his exile at St. Helena. Near by is the sword worn during the campaign in Egypt, his gold repeating watch, cameo ring, tooth-brushes, coffee-pot, camp knife, fork, and spoon, gold snuff-box, &c.

But the most actual relic, perhaps, is a portion of the real corporeal Napoleon himself, being nothing more nor less than one of his teeth, which was drawn by Dr. O'Meara. These relics are of a description to gratify the taste of the most inveterate relic-hunter. I give a few more that are pencilled in my note-book as attracting my own attention; the atlas that Bonaparte used many years, and on which are the plans of several battles sketched by his own hand,--a most suggestive relic this of the anxious hours spent in poring over it by the great captain, who marked out on this little volume those plans which crumbled kingdoms and dissolved dynasties; simple sketches to look upon, but which were once fraught with the fate of nations,--his dessert services, locks of his hair, camp service, shirts, under-waistcoats, and linen handkerchiefs, pieces of furniture, &c. Besides this large collection of relics of the great emperor, there are a number of other interesting historical relics of undoubted authenticity, such as the ribbon of Lord Nelson, a lock of Wellington's hair, George IV.'s handkerchief, the shirt of Henry IV. of France, the very one worn by him when assassinated by Ravaillac, and stained with the blood which followed the murderous knife, Lord Nelson's coat, the shoe of Pius VI., a ribbon of the Legion of Honor worn by Louis Philippe, coat and waistcoat of the Duke of Wellington, and, in a glass case, the three great state robes of George IV. These are of purple and crimson velvet, lined with ermine, and richly embroidered, the "three together containing five hundred and sixty-seven feet of velvet and embroidery,"--so the catalogue tells you,--"and costing eighteen thousand pounds."

The last department of this exhibition is one the name of which is quite familiar, and often quoted by American readers, viz., the Chamber of Horrors. The collection here is of figures of noted murderers and criminals, said to be portraits of the originals, and various models and relics. Perhaps the most interesting of the latter to the spectator is the original knife of the guillotine, used during the Reign of Terror in Paris. This axe, the catalogue tells us, was bought by Madame Tussaud of Sanson, grandson of the original executioner; and the now harmless-looking iron blade, that the spectator may lay his hands upon, is the terrible instrument that decapitated over twenty thousand human victims. It has reeked with the blood of the good, the great, and the tyrannical--the proudest blood of France and the basest. The visitor may well be excused a shudder as his hand touches the cold steel that has been bathed in the blood of the unfortunate Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, the tyrant Robespierre, and the thousands of unhappy victims that yielded up their lives beneath its fatal stroke. I confess that this Chamber of Horrors is unpleasantly interesting even to the sight-seer. I felt uncomfortable the brief time I spent there, breathed freer as I emerged from it, and felt as if escaping pursuit from some of its ruffianly inmates as I dashed away through the throng of vehicles in a Hansom cab to my hotel.

Theatre-going in London is an expensive amusement. In the theatres--that is, the good and respectable ones--there is no chance for people of moderate means, except the undesirable places that cannot be filled in any other way than by selling the admission at a rate within their reach. There is no theatre in London in size, appointments, and conveniences equal in all respects to the great ones in some of our large cities, and nothing that can compare with Booth's, of New York, or the Globe, of Boston. It is impossible to get such an entertainment as you may have in America at Booth's, Wallack's, or the Globe at anything like the price.

For instance, at Drury Lane Theatre the prices are, stalls, one dollar and seventy-five cents, gold; dress circle, one dollar and twenty-eight cents; second ditto, one dollar; pit, fifty cents; gallery, twenty-five cents. It should be understood that "stalls" take in the whole of the desirable part of the parquet, and that some half dozen rows of extreme back seats, in the draught of the doors, and almost beyond hearing and sight of the stage, are denominated "the pit;" and in some theatres it is a "pit" indeed. The auditoriums of their theatres are in no way so clean, well kept, or bright looking as those of leading American theatres in New York and Boston. Even at the old dirty Princess's Theatre, where I saw Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra very handsomely put upon the stage, and Miss Glyn as Cleopatra, the orchestra stalls cost one dollar and fifty cents, gold, and the pit, which was way back under the boxes, was vocal between the acts with venders of oranges, nuts, and ginger beer.

The Lyceum Theatre, where I saw Fechter play, was a neat and well-ordered establishment, and stalls, one dollar and sixty cents; upper circle, one dollar; pit, fifty cents. I give the prices in American money, gold, that they may be compared with our own. There is not a theatre in London where a performance, and accommodation to the auditor equal to that at the Boston Museum, can be had for three times the price of admission to that establishment. The prices above given being about the average at the leading theatres, what does the reader expect he will have to pay for the opera? Let us see.

At Her Majesty's Theatre, where I had the pleasure of listening to Nilsson in Traviata and Titiens, in Oberon, Fidelio, &c., my play-bill informs me the prices are, pit stalls, fifteen shillings (about three dollars and forty cents in gold), boxes, two dollars and a half, and gallery, sixty cents. The pit, at this theatre, consists of four or five rows of narrow boards, at the extreme rear of the parquet, purposely made as narrow, uncomfortable, and inconvenient as can be, so that it is almost impossible to sit through a performance on them; yet, during the one act that I occupied a seat there, it was nearly filled with very respectable people, in full dress, no one being admitted who is not so costumed. I presume that the labor expended to render these seats disagreeable, is to force the public into the higher-priced ones, which are easy, comfortable, and even luxurious, and where one may be pretty sure that he is in the best society.

An American lady, who goes to the theatre or opera in London, must remember that she will not be permitted to enter the stalls or boxes with a bonnet on, no matter how infinitesimal, elegant, or expensive it may be. Full dress means, no bonnet for ladies, and dress coats, dark vests and pantaloons for gentlemen. A lady seen passing in with bonnet on is expected to leave it at the cloak-room, to be redeemed by payment of sixpence on coming out; and no amount of argument will admit an independent American voter, who comes in a frock coat and drab pantaloons. I saw an ingenious American once, who overcame the frock coat difficulty by stepping outside, and getting his companion to pin up the skirts of that offending garment at each side, so that it made an extemporaneous "claw hammer" that passed without question.

Bills of the play are not furnished by the theatre to its patrons. You buy a big one for a penny of a boy outside the theatre, as you arrive at the door, that will soil your kid gloves with printer's ink; or a small one, for two or three pence, of the usher inside, who shows you a seat, and "expects something," as everybody does, in England. At the opera your bill will cost you sixpence, for it is expected that "the nobs" who go there never carry anything so base as copper in their pouches. Indeed, I noticed that one of the aforesaid ushers, to whom I handed a shilling, stepped briskly away, and omitted to return me any change. I learned better than to hand ushers shillings, and expect change, after a few nights' experience, and had threepences ready, after the English style.

We need not go through a description of the theatres of London. There are as many varieties, and more, than in New York; and you may go from the grand opera, which is the best of that kind of entertainment, to the Alhambra, a grand variety affair, but most completely got up in all departments, or the cheaper theatres, where the blood-and-thunder drama is produced for a shilling or sixpence a ticket.

The appearance of the dress circle boxes at the opera is magnificent. The ladies fairly blaze with diamonds and jewels, while silks, luxurious laces, splendid fans, scarfs, shawls, and superb costumes, make a brilliant picture that it is interesting to look upon. The extreme _décolleté_ style of dress, however, was most remarkable. I have seen nothing to compare with it, even at the Jardin Mabille, or at the Cafés Chantants, in Paris, where the performers are wont to make so much display of their charms. Upon the stage, such undressing of the neck and bust would excite severe criticism, but in the fashionable boxes of the opera, it passes unchallenged.

The liberal encouragement which the opera receives in England enables the management to produce it in far more complete and perfect style than it is usually seen in America. Indeed, some of the wretched, slipshod performances that have been given under the name of grand opera in America, would be hissed from the stage in London, Paris, or Italy. In operatic performances in America, we have the parts of two or three principals well done, but all else slipshod and imperfect, and the effect of the opera itself too frequently marred by the outrageous cuttings, transpositions, and alterations made by managers to adapt it to their resources.

The production of the opera in London is made with an orchestra of nearly a hundred performers, a well-trained chorus of sixty voices, dresses of great elegance, and correct and appropriate costume and style, even to the humblest performer. The opera, in all its details, is well performed, and the music correctly given; the scenery and scenic effects excellent, the auxiliaries abundant, so that a stage army looks something like an army, and not a corporal's guard; a village festival something like that rustic celebration, and not like the caperings of a few Hibernians, who have plundered a pawnbroker's shop, and are dancing in the stolen clothes.

Apropos of amusements, a very pleasant excursion is it by rail to the Sydenham Crystal Palace, where great cheap concerts are given, and one of those places in England where the people can get so much amusement, entertainment, and recreation for so little money. A ticket, including admission to the palace and grounds, and passage to and from London on the railroad, is sold at a very low sum, the entertainment being generally on Saturdays, which, with many, is a half holiday. Two of the London railways unite in a large, handsome station at Sydenham, from which one may walk under a broad, covered passage directly into the palace, this covered way being a colonnade seven hundred and twenty feet long, seventeen feet wide, and twenty feet high, reaching one of the great wings of the palace.

And this magnificent structure, its splendid grounds and endless museum of novelties, is a monument of English public spirit and liberality; for it was planned, erected, and the whole enterprise carried out by a number of gentlemen, who believed that a permanent edifice, like the one which held the great exhibition in Hyde Park in 1851, would be of great benefit in furthering the education of the people, and affording sensible and innocent recreation at the cheapest possible rate. And right nobly have they performed their work in the production of this magnificent structure, which fairly staggers the American visitor by its beauty, as well as its vastness, and its wondrous grace and lightness. It is a great monument of graceful curves and flashing glass, situated upon the summit of a gradual slope, with superb broad terraces, adorned with statues, grand flights of steps descending to elegantly laid out grounds, with shrubs, flowers, trees, fountains, ponds, rustic arbors, and beautiful walks; and these front terraces and grounds commanding one of those splendid landscape pictures for which England is so celebrated.

There is no better way of giving the reader an idea of the size of this magnificent structure, than by means of a few figures. The palace was completed in 1854 by a joint-stock company of gentlemen. It occupies, with its gardens and grounds, about three hundred acres, and cost, when completed, with its gardens, nearly two million pounds sterling. Think of the public being able to visit this splendid place for one shilling!

The length of the main building of the palace is over sixteen hundred feet; the width throughout the nave, three hundred and twelve feet, which, at the grand centre, is increased to three hundred and eighty-four feet; in addition to which are two great wings, of five hundred and seventy-four feet each; the height, from floor to ceiling, one hundred and ten feet; twenty-five acres of glass, weighing five hundred tons, were used in the building, and nine thousand six hundred and forty-one tons of iron. Graceful galleries run around the sides, and grand mammoth concerts and other entertainments are given in the central transept, the arch of which rises in a graceful span to the height of one hundred and seventy-five feet: the whole of one end of this transept is occupied by seats, rising one above the other, for the accommodation of four thousand performers, who performed at the great Handel Festival. A great organ, built expressly for the place, occupies a position at the rear of these orchestra seats.

I was present at a grand musical performance in this transept, and, from an elevated seat in the orchestra, had a superb view of the whole audience below, which occupied chairs placed in the transept; these chairs which now faced the organ and orchestra, when turned directly about, would face the stage of a theatre, upon which other performances were given. The view of the crowd, from the elevated position I occupied, gave it the appearance of a huge variegated flower-bed, and its size may be realized when the reader is informed that there were _eight thousand_ people present; besides these, there were between three and four thousand more in different parts of the building and grounds. I obtained these figures from the official authorities, who informed me that on greater occasions, when the performance is more attractive, or upon whole holidays, the number is very much larger.

The nave is divided into sections, or courts; such as the Sheffield Court, Manufacturing Court, Glass and China Court, Stationary Court, Egyptian Court, Italian Court, Renaissance Court, &c. These courts are filled with the products of the industry or art of the periods for which they are named. Thus, in the English Mediæval Court are splendid reproductions of mediæval architecture, such as the elegant doorway of Rochester Cathedral, doorway of Worcester Cathedral, the splendid Easter sepulchre from Hawton Church, the monument of Humphrey do Bohun from Hereford Cathedral, with the effigy of the knight in complete armor, and various architectural specimens from the ancient churches and magnificent cathedrals of England, all exact counterfeit presentments, executed in a sort of composition in imitation of the original. The Renaissance Court contains elegant reproductions of celebrated specimens of architecture of that period, elaborate and profuse in decoration. Then we have the Elizabethan, Italian, and Greek Courts, each a complete museum in itself of reproductions of architecture, and celebrated monuments of their periods. The Sheffield, Manufacturers, Glass and China Courts, &c., contain splendid exhibitions of specimens of the leading manufacturers, of those species of goods, of some of the best products of their factories.

Stalls are prepared for the sales of the lighter articles, and attendants are present at the different show-cases, or departments to make explanations, or take orders from visitors who may be inclined. The display of English manufactures was a very good one, and the opportunity afforded them to display and advertise them, well improved by exhibitors. The interior of the palace contains also a great variety of statues, casts, models, artistic groups, and other works of art. The visitor need not leave for refreshments, as large and well-served restaurants for ladies and gentlemen are at either end of the building, beneath its roof.

Leaving the building for the grounds, we first step out upon a great terrace, fifteen hundred and seventy-six feet in length and fifty feet wide. Upon its parapet are twenty-six allegorical marble statues; and from this superb promenade the spectator has a fine view of the charming landscape, backed by blue hills in the distance, and the beautiful grounds, directly beneath the terrace, which are reached by a broad flight of steps, ninety-six feet wide, and are picturesquely laid out. A broad walk, nearly one hundred feet wide, six or eight fountains throwing up their sparkling streams, artificial lakes, beds of gay-colored flowers, curious ornamental temples and structures, tend to make the whole novel and attractive. After a stroll in this garden, visitors may saunter off to the other adjacent grounds at pleasure.

Leaving the gardens directly in front of the palace for the extensive pleasure-grounds connected with it, we passed through a beautiful shaded lane, and came first to the archery grounds, where groups were trying their skill in that old English pastime. Not far from here, a broad, level place, with close-cut, hard-rolled turf was kept for the cricketing grounds, where groups of players were scattered here and there, enjoying that game. Near by are rifle and pistol shooting galleries. In another portion of the grounds is an angling and boating lake, a maze, American swings, merry go-arounds, and other amusements for the people, the performances of those engaged in these games affording entertainment to hundreds of lookers-on.

A whole day may be very pleasantly and profitably spent at the Sydenham Palace, the attractions of which we have given but the merest sketch of; and that they are appreciated by the people is evidenced by the fact that the number of visitors are over a million and a half per annum. The railroad companies evidently make a good thing of it, and by means of very cheap excursion tickets, especially on holidays, induce immense numbers to come out from the city.

This Crystal Palace is the same one which stood in Hyde Park; only when it rose again at Sydenham, it was with many alterations and improvements. It was a sad sight to see, when we were there, large portions of the northern end, including that known as the tropical end,--the Assyrian and Byzantine Courts,--in ruins from the effects of the fire a few years ago; yet that destroyed seems small in comparison with the immense area still left.

The parks of London have been described so very often that we must pass them with brief allusion. Their vast extent is what first strikes the American visitor with astonishment, especially those who have moulded their ideas after Boston Common, or even Central Park of New York. Hyde Park, in London, contains three hundred and ninety acres; and we took a lounge in Rotten Row at the fashionable hour, between five and six in the afternoon, when the drive was crowded with stylish equipages; some with coroneted panels and liveried footmen, just such as we see in pictures. Then there were numerous equestrians, among whom were gentlemen mounted upon magnificent blood horses, followed at a respectful distance by their mounted grooms, and gracefully tipping their hats to the fair occupants of the carriages. Mounted policemen, along the whole length of the drive, prevented any carriage from getting out of line or creating confusion; and really the display of splendid equipages, fine horses, and beautiful women, in Hyde Park, of an afternoon, during the season, is one of the sights of London that no stranger should miss.

Every boy in America, who is old enough to read a story-book, has heard of the Zoölogical Gardens at Regent's Park, London; and it is one of the sights that the visitor, no matter how short his visit, classes among those he must see. This collection of natural history specimens was first opened to the public as long ago as 1828; it is one in which the Londoners take great pride, and the Zoölogical Society expend large sums of money in procuring rare and good living specimens. Improvements are also made every year in the grounds, and the exhibition is now a most superb and interesting one, and conducted in the most liberal manner.

Visitors are admitted on Mondays at sixpence each; on other days the price of admission is a shilling. Here one has an opportunity of seeing birds and animals with sufficient space to move about and stretch their limbs in, instead of the cruelly cramped quarters in which we have been accustomed to view them confined in travelling menageries, so cruelly small as to call for action of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, to interfere in behalf of the poor brutes, who often have only space to stand up in, and none to move about in, although their nature be one requiring exercise; and they therefore become poor, spiritless specimens, dying by slow torture of close confinement.

Here, however, the visitor finds different specimens of eagles, vultures, and other huge birds, each in great cages twenty feet high, and nearly as many square; owls, hawks, and other birds of prey, with cages big enough to fly about in; ibis, elegant flamingoes, pelicans, and water birds, in large enclosures, with ponds for them to enjoy their favorite pursuits. For some of the smaller birds aviaries were arranged, the size of a large room, part of it out in the open air, with shrubs and trees, and the other half beneath shelter--a necessity for some species of tropical birds. One, therefore, might look upon the flashing plumage and curious shapes of tropical birds flitting among the trees, and see all colors and every variety at the different aviaries. I saw the sea birds in a place which, by artificial means, was made to represent the sea-shore; there were rocks, marine plants, sea shells, sand, and salt water; and ducks, sandpipers, and gulls dove, ran and flew about very much as if they were at home. Passing into a house devoted exclusively to parrots, we were almost deafened by the shrieking, cat-calls, whistling, and screaming of two or three hundred of every hue, size, kind, and variety of these birds; there were gorgeous fellows with crimson coronets, and tails a yard in length,--blue, green, yellow, crimson, variegated, black, white, in fact every known color: the din was terrific, and the shouting of all sorts of parrot expressions very funny.

The collection of birds is very large, from the little wren to great stalking ostriches, vultures, and bald eagles, and only lacked the great condor of South America.

The animals were well cared for. Here were a pair of huge rhinoceroses enjoying themselves in a large, muddy pond in the midst of their enclosure, a stable afforded them dry in-door quarters when they chose to go in, and a passage through these stables enabled visitors always to see the animals when they were in-doors. Two huge hippopotami were also similarly provided for. Next came several elephants, great and small, with outer enclosures, where they received donations of buns and fruit, and stables for private life; also a splendid specimen of the giraffe, &c.

There was a vast collection of different specimens of deer, from the huge antlered elk to the graceful little gazelle, the size of an English terrier.

Then we came to the bear-pits. Here sauntered a great polar bear in a large enclosure, in which a tank of water was provided for his bearship to disport himself; a long row of great roomy cages of lions, tigers, leopards, and panthers, with their supple limbs, sleek hides, and wicked eyes; a splendid collection of the wolf, fox, and raccoon tribe; specimens of different varieties of sheep; the alpaca, zebras, camels, elands, and bison; enclosed ponds, with magnificent specimens of water fowl from all parts of the world; then there was the beaver pond, with his wood, and his dam, and hut; the seal tank and otter pond, with their occupants not always in view, but watched for by a curious crowd; and, near by, a house full of specimens of armadillos, and other small and curious animals.

The reptile house, with its collection of different specimens of snakes, from the huge boa constrictor to the small, wicked-looking viper, was not a pleasant sight to look upon; but one of the most popular departments of the whole exhibition was the monkey house, a building with ample space for displaying all the different specimens of this mischievous little caricature of man. In the centre of the room was a very large cage, fitted up with rings, ladders, trapezes, bars, &c., like a gymnasium, and in this the antics of a score of natural acrobats kept the spectators, who are always numerous in this apartment, in a continued roar of laughter.

Not the least amusing performance here was that of a huge old monkey, the chief of the cage by common consent, who, after looking sleepily for some half hour at the performances of his lesser brethren from the door of his hut in a lofty corner, suddenly descended, and, as if to show what he could do, immediately went through the whole performances seriatim. He swung by the rings, leaped from trapeze to trapeze, swung from ladder to bar, leaped from shelf to shelf, sent small monkeys flying and screaming in every direction, and then, amid a general chattering and grinning, retired to his perch, and, drawing a piece of old blanket about his shoulders, looked calmly down upon the scene below, like a rheumatic old man at the antics of a party of boys.

The young visitors at the Zoölogical Gardens have opportunity afforded them to ride the elephants and camels, and a band plays in the gardens on Saturdays. Members of the society have access to a library, picture gallery, and enjoy various other advantages in assistance of the study and investigation of natural history.

The Tower of London! How the scenes of England's history rise before the imagination, in which this old fortress, palace and prison by turns, has figured! It is a structure of which every part seems replete with story, and every step the visitor makes brings him to some point that has an interest attached to it from its connection with the history of the past.

The Tower has witnessed some of the proudest pageants of England's glory, and some of the blackest deeds of her tyranny and shame. The names of fair women, brave men, soldiers, sages, monarchs, and nobles,--

"Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,"--

are twined within its chronicles, and its hard, pitiless stones have frozen hope into despair in some of the noblest hearts that ever beat on English soil.

Here Lady Jane Grey fell beneath the headsman's axe; Clarence was drowned in the butt of Malmsey; Anne Boleyn was imprisoned, and later her proud daughter, Princess, afterwards Queen, Elizabeth, passed a prisoner through the water-gate; Buckingham, Stafford, William Wallace, Essex, Elizabeth's favorite, Lord Bacon, Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley heard its gates clang behind them; King Henry VI. and the princes were murdered here by Richard III.'s orders. But why continue the catalogue of names, of deeds, and of scenes that come thronging into one's mind as we approach this ancient pile, that is invested with more historic interest than any other European palace or prison?

Its foundation dates back to the time of Cæsar, and one of the towers is called Cæsar's Tower to this day, though the buildings, as they now stand, were commenced in the time of William the Conqueror.

Shakespeare has made this grim fortress so prominent a picture in his plays, that, with the same fancy that one looks for Shylock to-day upon the crowded Rialto, does the visitor, on approaching the Tower, shudder as if he were to encounter the crooked form of Gloucester, or hear, in the dark passages, the mournful wail of the spirits of the two innocent princes, torn from their mother's arms, and dying by his cruel mandate.

We sought the Tower on foot, but soon becoming entangled in a maze of crooked, narrow, and dirty streets, which doubtless might be very interesting to the antiquarian, but rather disagreeable to the stranger, we were glad to hail a cab, and be driven down to it. Here we found that the Tower of London was a great fortress, with over thirteen acres enclosed within its outer wall and the principal citadel, or White Tower, as it is called, with its one round and three square steeples, the most prominent one in view on approaching, and in appearance that which many of us are familiar with from engravings.

There are no less than thirteen towers in the enclosure, viz.: the Bloody Tower, the Bell Tower, Beauchamp Tower, Devereux Tower, Flint Tower, Bowyer Tower, Brick Tower, Jewel Tower, Constable Tower, Salt Tower, Record Tower, and Broad Arrow Tower. We come to the entrance gate, where visitors are received, and wait in a little office until twelve are assembled, or a warder will take charge of a party every half hour to go the rounds. The site of this building was where the lions were formerly kept. The warders, in their costume of yeomen of the guard of Henry VIII.'s time, are among the curiosities of the place. Their uniform, consisting of a low-crowned velvet hat, surrounded by a sort of garland, a broad ruff about the neck, and dark-blue frock, or tunic, with the crown, rose, shamrock, and thistle on the breast, and other embroidery upon the skirts, flaps, and belts, with trunks gathered at the knee with a gay-colored rosette, tight silk stockings and rosetted shoes, looked oddly enough, and as if some company of supernumeraries, engaged for a grand theatrical spectacle, had come out in open daylight. These warders are principally old soldiers, who receive the position as a reward for bravery or faithful service.

The Tower is open to visitors from ten to four; the fee of admission sixpence, and sixpence more is charged for admission to the depository of the crown jewels; conspicuous placards inform the visitor that the warders have no right to demand or receive any further fee from visitors; but who has ever travelled in England, and gone sight-seeing there, but knows this to be, if he is posted, an invitation to try the power of an extra shilling when occasion occurs, and which he generally finds purchases a desirable addition to his comfort and enjoyment?

However, on we go, having purchased tickets and guide-books, following the warder, who repeats the set description, that he has recited so often, in a tedious, monotonous tone, from which he is only driven by the curious questions of eager Yankees, often far out of his depth in the way of knowledge of what certain rooms, towers, gates, and passages are noted for. We hurried on over the moat bridge, and halted to look at Traitor's Gate; and I even descended to stand upon the landing-steps where so many illustrious prisoners had stepped from the barge on their way to the prisons. Sidney, Russell, Cranmer, and More had landed here, and Anne Boleyn's dainty feet, and Elizabeth's high-heeled slippers pressed its damp stones. On we pass by the different towers, the warder desirous of our seeing what appears to him (an old soldier) the lion of the place--the armory of modern weapons, which we are straightway shown. Thousands and thousands of weapons--pistols, swords, cutlasses, and bayonets--are kept here, the small arms being arranged most ingeniously into a number of astonishing figures. Here were the Prince of Wales's triple feather in glittering bayonets, a great sunburst made wholly of ramrods, a huge crown of swords, and stars, and Maltese crosses of pistols and bayonets; the serried rows of muskets, rifles, and small arms in the great hall would have equipped an army of a hundred thousand.

But we at last got into the Beauchamp, or "Beechum" Tower, as our guide called it; and here we began to visit the prisons of the unhappy captives that have fretted their proud spirits in this gloomy fortress. Upon the walls of the guarded rooms they occupied they have left inscriptions and sculpture wrought with rude instruments and infinite toil, during the tedious hours of their imprisonment. Here is an elaborate carving, by Dudley, Earl of Warwick, brother to the Lord Dudley who married Lady Jane Grey. It is a shield, bearing the Lion, Bear, and Ragged Staff, and surrounded by a wreath of oak leaves, roses, and acorns, all cut in the stone, and underneath an inscription, in Old English letters, stating that his four brothers were imprisoned here. In another room is the word JANE cut, which is said to refer to Lady Jane Grey, and to have been cut by her husband. Marmaduke Neville has cut his name in the pitiless stone, and a cross, bleeding heart, skeleton, and the word Peverel, wrought under it, tell us that one of the Peverels of Devonshire has been confined here: over the fireplace the guide points us to the autograph of Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, who was beheaded in 1572 for aspiring to the hand of Mary, Queen of Scots. Arthur Poole, who conspired to place Mary on the English throne, left an inscription "I.H.S. A passage perillus makethe a port pleasant." 1568. A. Poole. Numerous other similar mementos are shown, cut in the walls of the apartments of this tower, the work of the prisoners who formerly occupied them, and the names thus left are often those who figure in English history.

In the White Tower we were shown a room, ten by eight, receiving light only from the entrance, which, it is stated, was one of the rooms occupied by Sir Walter Raleigh, and that in it he wrote his History of the World. Right in front of this, in the centre of the room, stands the beheading block that has been used on Tower Hill, and the executioner's axe beside it, which, in Elizabeth's reign, severed Essex's head from his body. The block bears the marks of service in the shape of more than one dint from the weapon of death. Some idea of the strength of this tower, and its security as a prison, may be had from the walls, which are from twelve to fourteen feet in thickness. In this White Tower is the great Council Chamber of the early English kings, and here, beneath the great, massive-timbered roof, we stand where King Richard II. resigned his crown to Bolingbroke, in 1399. We pass on to the Brick Tower, another prison, where Raleigh was once confined--Raleigh, the friend of Bacon and Shakespeare, who here spent the last ten days of his life, and many a weary year before. But we found there was one tower, among others, that was not visited by the guide with our party; it was the one of all others we wished to see--the Bloody Tower.

"We are not hallowed to show that," said our guide, in response to our solicitations.

"Is it not possible?" said I, in a low tone, putting one hand into my pocket, jingling some loose silver, and looking the burly warder in the eye, as I fell back a little from the rest of the party.

"Hi couldn't say really, but (_sotto voce_, as a shilling dropped into his palm, that was conveniently open behind him) hif you'll lag be'ind the party when they go out, I'll see what can be done."

We took occasion to follow the warder's hint, and after he had conducted the others to the gate, he returned, and took us to the room over the entrance-gate in which the princes were lodged, and where, by their uncle's order, they were smothered. This little room--about twelve feet square--has an inner window, through which, it is said, Tyrell, the crook-back tyrant's instrument, looked, after the murder had been done by his hired ruffians, to be sure that his master's fell purpose was complete. This room, small as it was, had a pleasant outlook, commanding views of the interior of the Tower wards and gardens--in fact, it used to be called Garden Tower--and the Thames River. The stairs leading from this part of the Tower to the gateway were shown us, and the place, not far from their foot, where the supposed remains of these unfortunate princes were afterwards discovered, and removed and interred at Westminster Abbey.

After seeing various dismal vaults and cells, which our guide, desirous of showing his appreciation of our bounty, conducted us to beneath the towers, holding his candle to show the carving made by wretched prisoners by the dim light that struggled in when they were confined there, he took us to one, his description of which rather shook our faith in his veracity. It was a small, arched cell, about ten feet high, and not more than four feet deep, without grating, window, or aperture, except a door.

"This," said he, swinging open the huge iron-strapped and bolted door, "this was Guy Fawkes's dungeon; he was confined here three days, with no more light and h'air than he could get through the key-'ole."

"But," said I, "no man could live in that cell _half_ a day; he would die for lack of air."

"But," said our cicerone, depreciatingly, "your _h_onor doesn't consider the size of the key-'ole."

No, but we did the size of the story, and felt convinced that we were getting a full shilling's worth extra.

But if there were any doubt about the Guy Fawkes cell, there was none about many other points of historical interest, which, after learning the names of a few of the principal ones, could be easily located by those familiar with the history of the Tower, and even by those of us who only carried some of the leading events of England's history in mind. One of these points was a little enclosed square, in front of St. Peter's Chapel, in the open space formed by that edifice on one side, Beauchamp Tower on the other, and the White Tower on the third, in the place known as Tower Green. This little square, of scarce a dozen feet, railed with iron to guard the bright greensward from profane tread, is the spot on which stood the scaffold, where, on the 19th of May, 1536, Anne Boleyn bent her fair head to the block; the fall of which beneath one blow of the executioner's sword, was announced by the discharge of a gun from the Tower ramparts, so that her husband, that savage and brutal British king, who was hunting in Epping Forest, might be apprised that she had yielded up her life; and history tells us that this royal brute of the sixteenth century returned that very evening gayly from the chase, and on the following morning married Jane Seymour.

Here, also, upon the earth enclosed in the little square round which we were standing, poured forth the precious blood of Bloody Mary's victim, Lady Jane Grey; here is where, after saying to the executioner, "I pray you despatch me quickly," she knelt down, groped for the fatal block, bent her innocent neck, and passed, with holy words upon her lips, into that land where opposing creeds shall not harass, nor royal ambition persecute.

Here also was that murder (it could not be called execution) done by order of Henry VIII. on the Countess of Salisbury, a woman, seventy years of age, condemned to death without any form of trial whatever; who, conscious of her innocence, refused to place her head upon the block. "So traitors used to do, and I am no traitor," said the brave old countess, as she struggled fiercely with her murderers, till, weak and bleeding from the soldiers' pikes, she was dragged to the block by her gray hair, held down till the executioner performed his office, and the head of the last of the Plantagenets, the daughter of the murdered Clarence, fell; and another was added to the list of enormities committed by the bloated and sensual despot who wielded the sceptre of England.

The soil within this little enclosure is rich with the blood of the innocent victims of royal tyranny; and it was not astonishing that we lingered here beyond the patience of our guide.

The collection of ancient armor and arms at the Tower is one of great interest, especially that known as the Horse Armory, which contains, besides a large and curious collection of portions of armor and weapons, a great number of equestrian figures, fully armed and equipped in suits of armor of various periods between Edward I., 1272, and the death of James I., 1625. This building is over one hundred and fifty feet long, by about thirty-five wide, and is occupied by a double row of these figures, whose martial and life-like appearance almost startles the visitor as he steps in amid this warlike array of mailed knights, all in the different attitudes of the tilting-ground or battle-field, silent and immovable as if they had suddenly been checked in mid career by a touch from the wand of some powerful enchanter.

Here, in flexible chain-mail hood, shirt, and spurs, stands the effigy of Edward I. (1272), the king in the act of drawing his sword; and clad in this armor were the knights who were borne to the earth on the fields of Dunbar and Bannockburn. Next rides at full tilt, with lance in rest, and horse's head defended by spiked chanfron, and saddle decorated with the king's badges, Edward IV., 1483; then we have the armor worn in the Wars of the Roses, and at Bosworth Field; here a suit worn by a swordsman in Henry VII.'s time, about 1487; next, a powerful charger, upon the full leap, bears the burly figure of Henry VIII., in a splendid suit of tilting armor, inlaid with gold: this suit is one which is known to have belonged to the tyrant; a sword is at the side of the figure, and the right hand grasps an iron mace. A splendid suit of armor is that of a knight of Edward VI.'s time (1552), covered all with beautiful arabesque work, inlaid with gold, and a specimen of workmanship which, it seemed to me, any of our most skilful jewellers of the present day might be proud of.

Then we have the very suit of armor that was worn by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, which is profusely decorated with that oft-mentioned badge of the Dudleys, the Bear and Ragged Staff that they appeared to be so fond of cutting, carving, stamping, and engraving upon everything of theirs, movable and immovable. His initials, R. D., are also engraved on the knee-guards. The mounted figure of Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, 1581, in his splendid suit of gilt armor; effigy of Henry, Prince of Wales, riding, rapier in hand, in the armor made for him in the year 1612--a splendid suit, engraved and adorned with representations of battle scenes; the armor made for King Charles I. when a youth; James II., 1685, in his own armor. Besides these were numerous other figures, clad in suits of various periods. One very curious was a suit wrought in Henry VIII.'s time, which was composed entirely of movable splints, and almost as flexible as an overcoat; a figure clad in splendid plated armor, time of Henry VII., with ancient sword in hand, battle-axe at the saddle-bow, and the horse protected by armor in front--the whole figure a perfect realization of the poet's and artist's idea of a brave knight sheathed in gleaming steel.