. St. Nicholas [serial]. oo watch-ful keeper, bethought himself of taking a quarter of an hour later, there-were noticedstrange tracks in the snow on the path leadingdown to the bear-dens. For a time, it was sup-posed that one of the young elephants had es- POSITIVELY THE OLDEST INHABITANT 689 caped, and great was the consternation in conse-quence. But the tracks, though somewhat like anelephants, were still obviously not an elephants,since none of that tribe were missing. Subse-quent investigation discovered our friend theGiant Tortoise serenely contemplating his fellow-captives of t
. St. Nicholas [serial]. oo watch-ful keeper, bethought himself of taking a quarter of an hour later, there-were noticedstrange tracks in the snow on the path leadingdown to the bear-dens. For a time, it was sup-posed that one of the young elephants had es- POSITIVELY THE OLDEST INHABITANT 689 caped, and great was the consternation in conse-quence. But the tracks, though somewhat like anelephants, were still obviously not an elephants,since none of that tribe were missing. Subse-quent investigation discovered our friend theGiant Tortoise serenely contemplating his fellow-captives of the bear-dens ! The problem of re-turning him to his own inclosure was met by fac- along the Atlantic coast represented all that wasto be the future United States; James Oglethorpehad not yet founded the colony of Georgia; andtwenty years must elapse before the birth ofGeorge Washington. While yet this reptile was, comparativelyspeaking, a mere infant, the American and Frenchrevolutions occurred, and the United States as-. THE GALAPAGOS TORTOISE AT THE ZOOLOGICAL PARK—DINNER-TIME. ing him in the proper direction, and giving him asmart rap on his shell. In the course of time, hisleisurely locomotion brought him back to his ownlawful domain. Perhaps in all the two centuriesof his existence, he had never experienced any-thing quite so exciting before ! But it is the astonishing age of these reptilesthat suddenly causes us to look upon the span ofthreescore years and ten as a paltry and insignifi-cant thing indeed. Let us stand before the inclo-sure and consider these facts: here is a living,breathing creature, moving about and consumingfood even as ourselves. Yet when it first sawthe light (1712 or before), Queen Anne still oc-cupied the throne of England, and Louis XIVthat of France. A line of thinly settled villagesVol. sumed its place among the nations; and no onecan tell to what age this creature may yet it has grown since its introduction to thepark
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Keywords: ., bookauthordodgemar, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookyear1873
