A little way outside the busy shipping port of Hamburg is the pretty little suburban village of Stellingen. Here is located the largest wild-animal exchange in the world--the one place where strange and curious beasts from the four quarters of the earth are received and housed until wanted by the great zoological gardens and menageries. It is hardly necessary to add that this unique establishment is presided over by Mr. Carl Hagenbeck, famous as the most successful animal dealer the modern world has ever seen, and as the creator of a decidedly original zoological garden. At Mr. Hagenbeck's great depôt there may be seen at any time the finest and rarest collection of animals in the world. When the writer was in Stellingen recently the value of the wild beasts gathered there was put down at fifty thousand pounds, and they certainly included almost every living creature one could name, among them being many very rare species. Naturally, the most romantic part of the whole business is the way in which the animals are captured in their native wilds and brought--sometimes thousands of miles--to the depôt, and the object of the present article is to describe this side of a strange yet fascinating trade. There is a vast difference between the hunter who kills for pleasure and the hunter whose business it is to capture his quarry alive. The former merely seeks his quarry, shoots it, secures a skin or horn as a trophy, and then returns. True, he meets with many adventures and has often exciting stories to tell of fights with enraged beasts. But the collector stands on a different plane; his mission is not to exterminate, but to preserve for the education and benefit of civilized man. He may rightly be described as the humane invader of the forest, jungle, desert, and plain, for he never kills unless it is necessary for self-preservation. He sets out with the determination to bring back typical specimens of the wild life of out-of-the-way parts of the earth, so that those who pursue more peaceful callings at home may obtain some idea of the characteristics and habits of the curious beasts that inhabit the more inaccessible parts of the globe.