INTRODUCTORY. 3 
saw the Reptile, gently picked it up, and returned it to the bottle, 
where I found it on my return. 
This somewhat trivial circumstance is mentioned simply to 
remind how easily children may be taught to have a horror of 
Reptiles, and how easily that horror may be dissipated by proving 
to them there is nothing repellent and dangerous in harmless 
animals of this kind. Of course, those who live in England 
should be taught to recognise the Viper (Pel/as berus). 
Reptiles are exceedingly interesting, wonderfully varied, very 
soon get tame, and are, perhaps, far more easily kept in a contented 
and healthy condition in confinement than any other animal. 
Other pets suffer severely if neglected for a day or even part of a 
day, but Reptiles are as wonderful in their powers of fasting as in 
their powers of feasting. A small Snake, for instance, will eat 
at one time, and without division, an animal so Jarge that to the 
uninitiated it would seem an utter impossibility, and yet the same 
Snake might fast for a whole year and suffer no injury. 
Some Reptiles and Batrachians only feed at night, others only 
in the daytime; some prefer shade, others sunshine; some lay 
eggs, others produce their young alive; some are delicate and 
short-lived, while others are so robust as to exist for more than a 
hundred years ; some will die upon receiving the slightest blow, 
while others will not only survive mutilation, but will even 
reproduce a limb nearly as often as it is amputated; some live 
altogether in water, others will never voluntarily enter it; some 
are famous climbers, even scorning the laws of gravitation, while 
others cannot climb at all; some seem to possess all the colours of 
the rainbow, while others are of the soberest tints ; some have the 
power of making noise out of all proportion to their size, and 
others have no voice of which man knows; some have the softest 
skin, but others are covered, both above and below, with very 
hard shell; some can give most deadly wounds, while others can 
give no wounds at all; some ——. But enough, I think, has 
been said, awkwardly no doubt, but I hope briefly, to remind one 
that, at any rate, there is much that is interesting, curious, 
wonderful, and instructing in these creatures, which are so ofter 
dreaded and ignored. 
The ignorance displayed by the general public in respect of 
B 2 
