I have known Neil for fifteen years now since he was a schoolboy modwith ambitions for adventure and I was an earnest young hippie who merely wanted to start a club for people interested in unknown animals. Nothing much has changed over the years. We are just both a tad older...From the Rochester Gazette & Weekly Advertiser, Tuesday July 19th 1831 Number 539 (Extracted from the Stirling Journal)
ENORMOUS SKATE – A skate of extraordinary dimensions was exhibited here on Saturday last. The gross weight was no less than 126 lbs, length measured 6 feet 8 ½ inches, and in circumference 11 feet 2 inches. It was captured in the stake nets off Hopetown House, a few miles on this side of Queensferry. The natural history of the skate presents a variety of singular facts, and not the least remarkable of its properties is that it can be preserved for an indefinite period without the application of salt…’
From the Rochester Gazette & Weekly Advertiser, Tuesday November 1st 1831 – Number 554 (Page 2) Extracted from the Kendall Chronicle
A SINGULAR CREATURE – On Sunday last, as William Musgrove, resident in Kirkland, was raking a stroll with one or two friends in the vicinity of Whitbarrow Scar, accompanied by a couple pf famous vermin hounds (we have his own authority for saying they are the best in all of England!) one of the dogs took the drag of what Musgrove thought at the time might be a martin or perhaps a fox. They ran this drag to about two miles when coming to the Scar they halted, and from their motions, which were as well understood by their master as if they had spoken the Kings English, Musgrove was convinced that the game was at hand, of whatever description it might then turn out to be. He and his friends therefore proceeded forthwith to assist their quadruped allies, and after some little difficulty succeeded in dragging the object of their pursuit from his romantic hiding place, when strange to say, it turned out to be a racoon! The captive stranger was in capital condition and was brought home by Musgrove in high glee. From appearances the animal had been in the neighbourhood of Whitbarrow Scar for a considerable time, to which seat of freedom he probably found his way from – caravan of wild animals, or from the caresses of some travelling foreigner.’
From the Rochester Gazette & Weekly Advertiser, Tuesday November 15th 1831 – Number 556 (Page 3)
‘The king presented to the Zoological Society the entire contents of his menagerie, now deposited in the Tower. They amount to almost thirty in number and include four lions, three bears (the large bear is an extraordinary animal), one black wolf, three blood hounds, five leopards and three hyenas.’
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