Carousel Walrus

The Unfortunate Carousel was the life's work of the regrettable Eighteenth Amir of Sarappa, who dedicated himself to creating the most lavish, elaborate, and grotesque carousel ever made. Carved by the finest artisans, inlaid with gems and precious metals, powered by experimental steam boilers and teams of bullocks, the genius of the Unfortunate Carousel was that it had no horses, but was instead made up of all of those beasts considered graceless, unlovely, unclean, and/or generally obnoxious. Rats and grackles cavorted alongside hippopotomi and squid, rhinos and jackals rode cheek-by-jowl with skunks and gila monsters. By the time it was finished, the Unfortunate Carousel rose two and a half stories, had cost forty-seven lives, driven two engineers mad, and brought the country to the brink of bankruptcy.

Unfortunately, on the first occasion when the carousel was fired up, the main boiler exploded two minutes in, causing general carnage and untold havoc and completely destroying the machinery. The Amir's plans to build a second, even more grandiose carousel were foiled when he was removed from power by an outraged peasantry wielding pitchforks and uninclined to discuss the finer points of carousel-making.

Specimens from the Unfortunate Carousel have turned up in numerous collections in the following centuries, including this very fine white walrus figure, in the private collection of the Marquis of Widdlemark.

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