437 



filth. Finding the job more than he could manage, he turned the 

 river Alpheus through it, and succeeded admirably. Would that 

 some modern contractor could be found to scour our own depart- 

 ments in zoology ! But if he be engaged, and clean water be re- 

 quired, he must not come into our manufacturing districts to look 

 for it. The rivers there (that of once merry Wakefield, to wit) have 

 now become so filthy and polluted, that, on looking at the stream, 

 you might fancy it had its source from under graves and charnel- 

 houses. 



In taking a retrospective view of what I have written on the 

 nature and habits of snakes, as it differs widely from the accounts 

 which we have already received, I really hesitate to lay these notes 

 before the public. May the following little adventure assist me in 

 obtaining the reader's confidence. 



It took place, some three or four years ago, in the rich and smoky 

 town of Leeds. 



There lived, in the interior of the United States, a country black- 

 smith, by name Vangordon. One day, having been seized, not by a 

 ferocious rattlesnake, but by a vehement desire to see the land of 

 his old grandfather Bull, of whom he had heard so many strange 

 accounts, as how that the old whimsical gentleman fancies himself 

 rolling in riches, although actually in debt to the incredible amount 

 of eight hundred millions of pounds sterling, &c. &c., he resolved to 

 cross the great pond which intervenes betwixt the pastures of Mr 

 Bull and the interminable regions of his grandson Jonathan. But 

 the cents were wanting. However, after much cogitation he be- 

 thought himself of a project, which probably had never entered into 

 the head of mortal man since the day of Noah's flood. He calcu- 

 lated that, as his grandfather Bull had no rattlesnakes in his pastures 

 at home, the old gentleman perhaps would like to see what kind of 

 animals they really are when alive and in vigour. So by hook and 

 by crook, this enterprising son of Vulcan actually managed to cap- 

 ture from thirty to forty rattlesnakes ; and having placed them care- 

 fully in a box which he had got made for the purpose, he set sail 

 with them from New York, on one fine summer's morning, for the 

 land of his ancestors, where he exhibited them with profit to himself 

 and with astonishment to all who went to see them. One of these 



