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all but destroyed the species. In 1880 the skins sold for only $18 a dozen, and nine years later, there were 435,000 pelts going to commercial buyers. It didn't take hunters long to locate the richest fur-bearers of all time. Yet so many of the animals were killed that even to see a chinchilla has become an event.
To save those gentle creatures by breeding them in captivity became an obsession with Chapman, although everyone with whom he talked warned him it could not be done. His own doubts arose not from climate and environment — but as to whether the chinchillas would cooperate. From the Chilean government he received sanction for his project, along with more warnings that he might expect only trouble as his reward.
Undeterred by such gloomy predictions, he sent 20 Indians into the mountains to get as many of the animals as they could capture alive. After working three years, they brought back three females and eight males. In order to get the animals accustomed to lower temperatures, the trip down to sea level was very slow. The animals all survived; but Chapman faced another obstacle; the captain of the ship to Los Angeles would not permit the animals to travel unless they went with the rest of the cargo in the hold, where the furnacelike temperature might kill them in a matter of minutes.
Mr. Chapman outwitted the captain by getting a cage smuggled into his stateroom as a trunk, and asking friends who came aboard to wish him "bon voyage" each to bring one of his pets in their pockets. When the cage
and animals were where he wanted them, Chapman sent the captain word that he valued his pets at one milUon dollars and would hold the boat in San Pedro harbor until such a sum was paid, if anything delayed the safe arrival of the chinchillas in Los Angeles. As a result, there were fans blowing on the chinchillas throughout the voyage, and they had ice near their cage, to provide the cold weather they love and to which they were accustomed.
ALTHOUGH none of them died, there was to be a fight for four years before that cargo made up its mind to cooperate and multiply. All the little foreigners had been born south of the equator where the seasons are just the opposite of Los Angeles. In June, July and August when the chinchillas were growing their warmest pelts, the thermometer was hitting over a hundred degrees in the shade. When they began shedding as they had always done in December, January and February, the temperature was fairly screaming, "Don't!"
So all year around the poor little things were in such acute distress that they refused to breed, had to be forced to eat, and required constant attention just to make them survive. Every Gloomy Gus kept repeating, "I told you so," but Chapman still would not listen.
During the fourth year when the animals and the calendar finally got into agreement, there came the biggest loss of all. A syndicate formed in Switzerland called about buying some breeding stock. Chapman had only 70 animals, which he refused to sell. The syndicate representative stole half the