Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 October 1897 — Using An Ape’s Weakness. [ARTICLE]

Using An Ape’s Weakness.

The late superintendent of the London Zoo, Mr. Bartlett, used to manage the animals by Indirect methods, akin to those by which nervous children are controlled by wise parents. A rhinoceros had a “bad place” on his face. The question was, Did the abscess come from a bad tooth, or did it only need lancing? Mr. Bartlett simply said to the keeper, “Give him a new birch broom.” The rhinoceros at once ate it, grinding up the bits with great gusto. “Ah! You see his teeth are all right,” said Mr. Bartlett, and the next day he lanced the abscess with a sharp bill-hook. The diagnosis was as ingenious as his method of managing ‘‘Joe,” a refractory champanzee. The Spectator describes the “indirect method:” “The big ape needed exercise. This he obtained by being allowed the run of the large monkey-house instead of remaining in a side room before the visitors came. As he knew he would be caught and put back into his own room at this hour, the ape used to climb to the top of the other monkeys* cages and refuse to come down. “As he could not be tempted by food, Mr. Bartlett appealed to his mind by working on what he had noted to be his weak points, curiosity and cowardice. “Mr. Bartlett went to the keeper, and touching him gently on the shoulder, directing his attention in a mysterious, manner to the dark passage underneath the gas-pipe which traverses tho house, pretending to point out to Sutton some horrible unknown creature, using an energetic manner, but saying nothing except words to this effect: ‘Look odt! There he is! There he is!’ At the same time the two men would peer into the dark place under the gas-pipe. “The monkey used presently to come down to see what the subject of fear and Interest was, when Mr. Bartlett and Sutton used to shout, ‘He’s coming out! He’s coming out!’ and rush away in the direction of Joe’s cage. The monkey would rush for the same place of safety, which happened to be the door of liis own house, and sometimes enter it before them. “The monkey never learned the deception, but would be taken in by it whenever the time came to finish his morning's airing.”