Struggles amd Triumphs: or, Forty Years' Recollections of P.T. Barnum

I WAS now fairly embarked on board the good old ship American Museum, to try once more my skill as captain, and to see what fortune the voyage would bring me. Curiosities began to pour into the Museum halls, and I was eager for enterprises in the show line, whether as part of the Museum itself, or as outside accessories or accompaniments. Among the first to give me a call, with attractions sure to prove a success, was James C. Adams, of hard-earned, grizzly-bear fame. This extraordinary man was eminently what is called “a character.” He was universally known as “Grizzly Adams,” from the fact that he had captured a great many grizzly bears, at the risk and cost of fearful encounters and perils. He was brave, and with his bravery there was enough of the romantic in his nature to make him a real hero. For many years a hunter and trapper in the Rocky and Sierra Nevada Mountains, he acquired a recklessness, which, added to his natural invincible courage, rendered him one of the most striking men of the age, and he was emphatically a man of pluck. A month after I had re-purchased the Museum, he arrived in New York with his famous collection of California animals, captured by himself, consisting of twenty or thirty immense grizzly bears, at the head of which stood “Old Sampson,” together with several wolves, half a dozen different species of California bears, California lions, tigers, buffalo, elk, and “Old Neptune,” the great sea-lion from the Pacific.

Old Adams had trained all these monsters so that with him they were as docile as kittens, though many of the most ferocious among them would attack a stranger without hesitation, if he came within their grasp. In fact the training of these animals was no fool’s play, as Old Adams learned to his cost, for the terrific blows which he received from time to time, while teaching them “docility,” finally cost him his life.

Adams called on me immediately on his arrival in New York. He was dressed in his hunter’s suit of buckskin, trimmed with the skins and bordered with the hanging tails of small Rocky Mountain animals; his cap consisting of the skin of a wolf’s head and shoulders, from which depended several tails, and under which appeared his stiff, bushy, gray hair and his long, white, grizzly beard; in fact Old Adams was quite as much of a show as his beasts. They had come around Cape Horn on the clipper ship “Golden Fleece,” and a sea voyage of three and a half months had probably not added much to the beauty or neat appearance of the old bear-hunter. During our conversation, Grizzly Adams took off his cap, and showed me the top of his head. His skull was literally broken in. It had on various occasions been struck by the fearful paws of his grizzly students; and the last blow, from the bear called “General Fremont,” had laid open his brain so that its workings were plainly visible. I remarked that I thought it was a dangerous wound and might possibly prove fatal.

“Yes,” replied Adams, “that will fix me out. It had nearly healed; but old Fremont opened it for me, for the third or fourth time, before I left California, and he did his business so thoroughly, I’m a used-up man. However I reckon I may live six months or a year yet.” This was spoken as coolly as if he had been talking about the life of a dog. The immediate object of “old Adams” in calling upon me was this; I had purchased, a week previously, one-half interest in his California menagerie, from a man who had come by way of the Isthmus from California, and who claimed to own an equal interest with Adams in the show. Adams declared that the man had only advanced him some money, and did not possess the right to sell half of the concern. However, the man held a bill of sale for half of the “California Menagerie,” and old Adams finally consented to accept me as an equal partner in the speculation, saying that he guessed I could do the managing part, and he would show up the animals. I obtained a canvas tent, and erecting it on the present site of Wallack’s Theatre, Adams there opened his novel California Menagerie. On the morning of opening, a band of music preceded a procession of animal cages down Broadway and up the Bowery, old Adams dressed in his hunting costume, heading the line, with a platform wagon on which were placed three immense grizzly bears, two of which he held by chains, while he was mounted on the back of the largest grizzly, which stood in the centre and was not secured in any manner whatever. This was the bear known as “General Fremont,” and so docile had he become, that Adams said he had used him as a pack-bear to carry his cooking and hunting apparatus through the mountains for six months, and had ridden him hundreds of miles. But apparently docile as were many of these animals, there was not one among them that would not occasionally give Adams a sly blow or a sly bite when a good chance offered; hence old Adams was but a wreck of his former self, and expressed pretty nearly the truth when he said:

“Mr. Barnum, I am not the man I was five years ago. Then I felt able to stand the hug of any grizzly living, and was always glad to encounter, single handed, any sort of an animal that dared present himself. But I have been beaten to a jelly, torn almost limb from limb, and nearly chawed up and spit out by these treacherous grizzly bears. However, I am good for a few months yet, and by that time I hope we shall gain enough to make my old woman comfortable, for I have been absent from her some years.”

His wife came from Massachusetts to New York and nursed him. Dr. Johns dressed his wounds every day, and not only told Adams he could never recover, but assured his friends, that probably a very few weeks would lay him in his grave. But Adams was as firm as adamant and as resolute as a lion. Among the thousands who saw him dressed in his grotesque hunter’s suit, and witnessed the seeming vigor with which he “performed” the savage monsters, beating and whipping them into apparently the most perfect docility, probably not one suspected that this rough, fierce looking, powerful demi-savage, as he appeared to be, was suffering intense pain from his broken skull and fevered system, and that nothing kept him from stretching himself on his death-bed but his most indomitable and extraordinary will.

Old Adams liked to astonish others, as he often did, with his astounding stories, but no one could astonish him; he had seen everything and knew everything, and I was anxious to get a chance of exposing this weak point to him. A fit occasion soon presented itself. One day, while engaged in my office at the Museum, a man with marked Teutonic features and accent approached the door and asked if I would like to buy a pair of living golden pigeons.

“Yes,” I replied, “I would like a flock of golden pigeons, if I could buy them for their weight in silver; for there are no ‘golden’ pigeons in existence, unless they are made from the pure metal.”

“You shall see some golden pigeons alive,” he replied, at the same time entering my office, and closing the door after him. He then removed the lid from a small basket which he carried in his hand, and sure enough, there were snugly ensconced a pair of beautiful, living ruff-necked pigeons, as yellow as saffron, and as bright as a double-eagle fresh from the mint.

I confess I was somewhat staggered at this sight and quickly asked the man where those birds came from. A dull, lazy smile crawled over the sober face of my German visitor, as he replied in a slow, guttural tone of voice:

“What you think yourself?”

Catching his meaning, I quickly replied:

“I think it is a humbug.”

“Of course, I know you will say so; because you ‘forstha’ such things; so I shall not try to humbug you; I have color them myself.”

On further inquiry I learned that this German was a chemist, and that he possessed the art of coloring birds any hue desired, and yet retain a natural gloss on the feathers, which gave every shade the appearance of reality.

“I can paint a green pigeon or a blue pigeon, a gray pigeon or a black pigeon, a brown pigeon or a pigeon half blue or half green,” said the German; “and if you prefer it, I can paint them pink or purple, or give you a little of each color, and make you a rainbow pigeon.”

The “rainbow pigeon” did not strike me as particularly desirable; but thinking here was a good chance to catch “Grizzly Adams,” I bought the pair of golden pigeons for ten dollars, and sent them up to the “Happy Family” (where I knew Adams would soon see them), marked, “Golden Pigeons, from California.” Mr. Taylor, the great pacificator, who had charge of the Happy Family, soon came down in a state of excitement.

“Really, Mr. Barnum,” said he, “I could not think of putting those elegant golden pigeons into the Happy Family, – they are too valuable a bird, and they might get injured; they are by far the most beautiful pigeons I ever saw; and as they are so rare, I would not jeopardize their lives for anything.”

“Well,” said I, “you may put them in a separate cage, properly labelled.”

Monsieur Guillaudeu, the naturalist and taxidermist of the Museum, had been attached to that establishment since the year it was founded, in 1810. He is a Frenchman, and has read nearly everything upon natural history that was ever published in his own or in the English language. When he saw the “Golden Pigeons from California,” he was considerably astonished. He examined them with great delight for half an hour, expatiating upon their beautiful color and the near resemblance which every feature bore to the American ruff-necked pigeon. He soon came to my office, and said:

“Mr. Barnum, these golden pigeons are superb, but they cannot be from California. Audubon mentions no such bird in his work upon American Ornithology.”

I told him he had better take Audubon home with him that night, and perhaps by studying him attentively he would see occasion to change his mind.

The next day, the old naturalist called at my office and remarked:

“Mr. Barnum, those pigeons are a more rare bird than you imagine. They are not mentioned by Linnæus, Cuvier, Goldsmith, or any other writer on natural history, so far as I have been able to discover. I expect they must have come from some unexplored portion of Australia.”

“Never mind,” I replied, “we may get more light on the subject, perhaps, before long. We will continue to label them ‘California Pigeons’ until we can fix their nativity elsewhere.”

The next morning, “Old Grizzly Adams,” passed through the Museum when his eyes fell on the “Golden California Pigeons.” He looked a moment and doubtless admired. He soon after came to my office.

“Mr. Barnum,” said he, “you must let me have those California pigeons.”

“I can’t spare them,” I replied.

“But you must spare them. All the birds and animals from California ought to be together. You own half of my California menagerie, and you must lend me those pigeons.”

“Mr. Adams, they are too rare and valuable a bird to be hawked about in that manner.”

“Oh, don’t be a fool,” replied Adams. “Rare bird, indeed! Why they are just as common in California as any other pigeon! I could have brought a hundred of them from San Francisco, if I had thought of it.”

“But why did you not think of it?” I asked, with a suppressed smile.

“Because they are so common there,” said Adams, “I did not think they would be any curiosity here. I have eaten them in pigeon-pies hundreds of times, and have shot them by the thousands!”

I was ready to burst with laughter to see how readily Adams swallowed the bait, but maintaining the most rigid gravity, I replied:

“Oh well, Mr. Adams, if they are really so common in California, you had probably better take them, and you may write over and have half a dozen pairs sent to me for the Museum.”

“All right,” said Adams, “I will send over to a friend in San Francisco, and you shall have them here in a couple of months.”

I told Adams that, for certain reasons, I would prefer to have him change the label so as to have it read: “Golden Pigeons from Australia.”

“Well, I will call them what you like,” said Adams; “I suppose they are probably about as plenty in Australia as they are in California.”

Six or eight weeks after this incident, I was in the California Menagerie, and noticed that the “Golden Pigeons” had assumed a frightfully mottled appearance. Their feathers had grown out and they were half white. Adams had been so busy with his bears that he had not noticed the change. I called him up to the pigeon cage, and remarked:

“Mr. Adams, I fear you will lose your Golden Pigeons; they must be very sick; I observe they are turning quite pale.”

Adams looked at them a moment with astonishment, then turning to me, and seeing that I could not suppress a smile, he indignantly exclaimed:

“Blast the Golden Pigeons! You had better take them back to the Museum. You can’t humbug me with your painted pigeons!”

This was too much, and “I laughed till I cried,” to witness the mixed look of astonishment and vexation which marked the grizzly features of old Adams.

After the exhibition on Thirteenth Street and Broadway had been open six weeks, the doctor insisted that Adams should sell out his share in the animals and settle up all his worldly affairs, for he assured him that he was growing weaker every day, and his earthly existence must soon terminate. “I shall live a good deal longer than you doctors think for,” replied Adams doggedly; and then, seeming after all to realize the truth of the doctor’s assertion, he turned to me and said: “Well, Mr. Barnum, you must buy me out.” He named his price for his half of the “show,” and I accepted his offer. We had arranged to exhibit the bears in Connecticut and Massachusetts during the summer, in connection with a circus, and Adams insisted that I should hire him to travel for the season and exhibit the bears in their curious performances. He offered to go for $60 per week and travelling expenses of himself and wife. I replied that I would gladly engage him as long as he could stand it, but I advised him to give up business and go to his home in Massachusetts; “for,” I remarked, “you are growing weaker every day, and at best cannot stand it more than a fortnight.”

“What will you give me extra if I will travel and exhibit the bears every day for ten weeks?” added old Adams, eagerly.

“Five hundred dollars,” I replied, with a laugh.

“Done!” exclaimed Adams, “I will do it, so draw up an agreement to that effect at once. But mind you, draw it payable to my wife, for I may be too weak to attend to business after the ten weeks are up, and if I perform my part of the contract, I want her to get the $500 without any trouble.”

I drew up a contract to pay him $60 per week for his services, and if he continued to exhibit the bears for ten consecutive weeks I was then to hand him, or his wife, $500 extra.

“You have lost your $500!” exclaimed Adams on taking the contract; “for I am bound to live and earn it.”

“I hope you may, with all my heart, and a hundred years more if you desire it,” I replied.