65
It was night when, after endless hardships,
They descended to the mighty harbour,
Where just ready to set sail to Europe,
With its white wings spread, the vessel lay.
Here aboard the royal party hastened,
After them the sailors raised the plank-way,
With a smile the schooner’s captain hailed them.
Cursed for aye, be that insidious snake!
He shall be in Culture’s golden pages
Ever mentioned with revolt and horror,
That black blemish on humanity,
Wild beast dealer, German Hagenbeck.
By a wily trick that wretch arrested
Hanuman, arrested, too, his escort,
Then he locked them up in spacious cages
With a crowd of creatures wild and scared,
Marabous and tortoises and gavials,
Antelopes and parrakeets and pythons,
Which for zoological collections
Through the Indian forests had been snared.
Thus, ah! thus that famous ape reformer,
With his ministry by law elected,
In a cage of rude uncultured monkeys,
Stuffed amid macaws and clacking rails,
Thus ah! thus on mouldy figs ill-nourished,
Stung by lash of angry whip and curses,
All of noblest birth in apedom’s empire,
To the world of western culture sails.
