China’s Own Animal: Panda

Dec 20
09:43

2011

macgrady

macgrady

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In 1869, David found the first living panda. He found it in Baoxing County, Sichuan Province. David tried to carry it to France, but he was unsuccessful. At last, he chose to make it into specimen, and then put it in the Paris's National Museum.

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David,China’s Own Animal: Panda Articles as a French missionary, he posted many plants' samples into France. Moreover, he brought many new species of plants into France and other European countries. In addition, he also found 58 birds, more than 100 new insects and a lot of significant new mammals in China. Among these new discoveries, there are panda, golden monkey and David's deer, which are our Chinese particular mammal.
In 1867, David came to China twice. He heard that there were many kinds of animals in the west of Sichuan Province. Moreover, some of them were rare species that people did not know. So David left Shanghai and came to Baoxing County of Sichuan Province. He held a post of the fourth priest in Dengchigou church.
Until the spring of 1869, David has done missionary work for more than 2 years in Dengchigou church. On the afternoon of March 11, David arrived to Dengchigou's source with a few people and collected several plants' specimens. Therefore they returned their church with joy. On their way to church, they came to a peasant's house. The master invited them into the house and offered them tea and pastries. At this time, the skin on the wall attracted David's attention. The skin was black and white. The host told him that this kind of animal was called "white bear", "spotted bear" or "bamboo bear" by the local people. He told them that this kind of animal was so meek that they seldom wounded anyone. A hunter in the house told David that he could see living animal soon. He was extremely fevered. Moreover, David thought this animal as a "new amusing species in science". He thought the find of this animal was significant in the world.
David employed 20 local hunters to catch this animal. The hunters caught a little white bear on 23rd in March. However, the hunters killed the little white bear so that they could take it more easily.
David got a good message from his hunters on May 4, in 1869. They caught a bamboo bear and six monkeys with long tail. So David thought very carefully and named them. Their names were "black white bear" and "snub-nosed monkey" respectively. It was downy and black and white. Its head was round and big. In addition, it always did funny and interesting actions. Therefore David was very fond of it. He weighed and measured it again and again. The local people were curious about his actions. He kept it for a span and decided to bring this lovely animal into Franca. At that time, they were Baoxing County which located in West Sichuan Plain. They wanted to leave there with the bear and brought it to transatlantic France. That was very difficult. They carried the bear to cross rivers and hills and stride the Atlantic. It was very hard to finish. As a result, the bear was dying in Chengdu because of long distance and climatic changes. He felt very regretful, but he had to do a sample with its skin. Later the specimen was displayed in Paris's National Museum. So the first panda's specimen in the world emerged.