Uncle Dick and Lisa's Old Time Animal Tales

Howes’ New York Menagerie was in town last week. The keeper’s familiarity with the Lions and Tigers when enclosed with them in their cages, is hardly a safe business after all. Few men have the nerve deliberately to “beard the lion in his den,” and rarely, since the days of Sampson, do we find one possessing hardihood to wrestle single handed with him. Week before last, when this Menagerie was at Chickopee Factory, one of the lions escaped from his cage. The pavilion had been erected and every thing was in readiness for the exhibition to commence. At this moment, when only the attendants were present, they were terrified at the sight of one of the lions among them. The bars of his cage had incautiously been left loose and he had liberated himself. Without a moments hesitation, the keeper, Mr. Whiting, approached him in a fearless and resolute manner, seized him by the throat, struck him violently with his whip and literally dragged this ferocious beast of the forest back into his cage! The other keepers looked on with terror and dismay, admiring the fearless and undaunted courage of that man, who dared wrestle with a lion.-Northampton Courier.