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[[newspaper article left side]]
Animal Collecting Not Entirely Adventure and Pith Helmets

Reporter Finds Combination of Rough Sea, Gravity and Irascible Beasts the Opposite

Bearing gifts for South American zoos, Dr. William M. Mann, director of the National Zoological Park is en route to points in Brazil, Argentine and Uruguay to collect birds, reptiles and animals.  Among those on board his ship is William. H. Shippen, jr., feature writer of The Star staff, who here presents the [[underline]] second [[/underline]] of a series of articles about Dr. Mann's expedition. ^[[April 17]]

By W.H. SHIPPEN, Jr.,
Star Staff Correspondent

ABOARD THE S.S. URUGUAY (By. airmail). - Today the third out of New York, I learned among other things, that the life of an animal collector is not all one grad adventure.
[[image - W.H. Shippen, Jr.]]
Even an amateur, a volunteer amateur, begins to comprehend, once he penetrates the veil of mystery, and gets down to the facts of life, that a shovel, a pair of overalls, and a lot of elbow grease can be more useful under certain circumstances than a pith helmet and English-cut riding breeches.
Carrying water in large buckets down steep stairways that pitch in more than one direction can be as hard to learn as a whole book on travel.  The law of gravity operates in unexpected ways on the landlubber.  Ask any seaman.
And the male buffalo didn't seem to care for what water I managed to bring alongside his crate on a work deck forward.  In the salon last night a lady passenger suggested one buffalo be called "Buddy" and the other "Sister."
"Butty" would be a better name for the male.  Each time I got a bucket inside the crate he butted it over-never having drunk from a bucket before.
"Butty" selected the moments when the ship rolled toward me.  Thus I got most of his drinking water in my lap.  The members of the crew, lounging about the galley were too polite to laugh.  They're all good American seamen and a few British tars-polite fellows, not entirely minus a sense of humor, but too sporting to indulge it at the expense of an amateur deck hand.
Zoo Director William M. Mann, despite the adventures of the day still will let me help a bit if I don't overdo it.  He has along only a few animals, compared with other trips he's taken, but is short-handed and anxious to keep expenses down.
The Texas wolves didn't seem to take to the water I brought either.  One kept splashing his out of the pan with his forepaws as fast as poured.  There was quite an audience.  Passengers (including several elderly ladies inclined to the critical side) had come forward to see the menagerie.
Advice From a Woman.
"Young man," said one old lady, "can't you see that wolf doesn't want to drink from such a dirty pan?"
"Madam," I replied, "I've rinsed that pan four times!"
"Rinsed it," she exclaimed,"-that's just the trouble.  You take that pan and scrub it."
The upshot was that being a timid soul, I did.
The wolf took one look at his bright and shining pan, sniffed contemptuously once, tipped it over and then went off to lie down in the rear corner of his cage.
The wild geese, the prairie dogs and the American bald eagles, however, are less difficult to please as are the civet cats and the bear cat.
As for the monitor, he may take on a little nourishment when we get to Buenos Aires, 15 days hence, or he may conclude to wait a few weeks longer.
He can take it or leave it alone!
Tomorrow: A man who hunts tigers with a spear

[[end article]]

[[newspaper article right side]]
Siemel, While Sun Sets, Tells Of Jaguar Hunts With a Spear

[[image - Sasha A. Siemel with a spear]]
Sasha A. Siemel shown with the speak he takes to the South American wilds to hunt jaguars. -A. P. Wirephoto

Bearing gifts for South American zoos, Dr. William M. Mann, director of the National Zoological Park, is en route to points in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay to collect birds, reptiles and animals.  Among those on board his ship is William H. Shippen, jr., feature writer of The Star staff, who here presents the [[underline]] third [[/underline]] of a series of articles about Dr. Mann's expeditions. ^[[April 18]]

By W. H. SHIPPEN, Jr.
Star Staff Correspondent,
ABOARD THE S.S. URUGUAY (by Airmail).-By the fourth day out the passengers began to get curious about him.
He wore the only beard on board, which made him conspicuous at first, but scarcely could account for any sustained interest.  Not even a set of Hollywood whiskers could do that.
[[image - W.H. Shippen, Jr.]]
There was something about the way he handled himself, walking a deck that could never catch him off balance, or swimming in the ship's pool.  In trunks he showed a muscular development surprising to those who had seen him in a dinner jacket.  Then he seemed a rather small man, studious and thoughtful-a clergyman on vacation perhaps.
"You know him, Bill," said Dr. William M. Mann today. "He's the fellow who lectured for the National Geographic Society in Washington recently.  He makes his living killing jaguars with a spear in the Matto Grasso.  He's an old friend of mine.  Perhaps he'll join us in a beer."
Sunset Fantasy.
Sasha A. Siemel presently joined us. "Us" included Mrs. Mann, who had heard Mr. Siemel lecture in Washington, and Dr. Walter Swingle, the Department of Agriculture horticulturist who, among other things, imported an improved date palm to California, and Eqyptian cotton to the Southwest.  Dr. Swingle-on "load" to the Brazilian government-was, like Mr. Siemel, bound for Rio.
"What a way to make a living," somebody said to Mr. Siemel.  "Just how does a young man get started in a business like that?"
The Russian grinned and spread his hands.  His blue eyes were animated.
"That is a long story," he said.  "Now that sunset out there . . . it is more of interest, yes?"
We looked out over the ocean.  Huge clouds were piled on the western rim, reaching an incredible height.  Haiti lay over that way, about 500 miles west, maybe a little north of west now.  The sun spread fiery colors through the cloud battlements and then plummeted below the horizon.
The purple clouds greyed, and suddenly it was dusk.
"When I Was Little . . ."
"sometimes, in the back country," said the Russian, "I see sights like that-maybe in the spring, with the trees blooming, and I laugh and shout.  My dopey Indians . . . they think I am crazy, yes?"
"I think they are wrong," said Dr. Swingle, "... But how did you become a jaguar hunter?"
"When I was little," the Russian ssaid, "my parents say to me, as parents say to you, and you-'Children should be seen and not heard.' I run away because I could not be heard.  That was 1906.  I was 16.
"I go to Germany a stowaway.  I work my way to New York as a ship's steward.  Two passages I work, saving a little, then in New York I duck out.  I catch the train for Chicago.  They are not too strict about immigration in those days.
"In Chicago I get a job-my life ambition! I am a candy salesman! Never could I get enough candy.  I eat and eat.  They say, 'The boy will get too much soon,' but they were wrong!  For eight months I eat candy.  Then I get fired.  I don't blame them.  The profits were going.  I still like candy.
I Cook, I chop, I Farm.
"Then I go to New York.  I work my way to Rio as second cook.  I couldn't cook, but I peel potatoes and boil water.  From Rio I go to the back country.  I learn to swing an ax, with a 5-foot handle.
"The first day the skin is off my hands.  The next, when I caught the ax, electric shocks ran to my shoulders.
"I worked on roads.
"Then I took some wild land to farm.  I chopped bushes, I chopped small tress, I pulled them together, I burned them. I girdled big trees.  I planted something and I harvested.  Then I quit farming.  I wanted no more work so heavy, so stupid, so dull.  I had a way with machinery.
"Always in the back country there is a ranchhouse with a broken sewing machine, a phonograph.  I travel in the back country.  I like the wilds.  I began to hunt jaguars.  Only down there they are not jaguars, they are 'tigers.'  Try to tell those people they are not tigers!
"Sometimes I kill a bad one.  The rancher gives me a horse, a cow.  I sell the skins.  Then I see the Indian kill a tiger with a spear.  I say I can do anything Indian can.  If he can learn why not me?  So we go together.  The first tiger I hunt with a spear would have killed me but for the Indian.
"Only I wouldn't been there without the Indian."
"What if you trip when the tiger charges?" Dr. Swingle was asked.
The Russian's laugh boomed forth.
"What if you fall overboard, doctor?" he said.
It was getting along toward the dinner hour.  The party was breaking up.
"Will you tell us more tomorrow?" I asked.
"If I do not bore you too much."