82 OUR COUNTRY NEIGHBORS. 



garden-snakes than there is in a robin or a squirrel ; they 

 are poor little, peaceable, timid creatures, which could not 

 do any harm if they would ; but the prejudices of society 

 are so strong against them, that one does not like to cul- 

 tivate too much intimacy with them. So we tried to turn 

 out of our path into a tangle of bushes ; and there, 

 instead of one, we found four snakes. We turned on the 

 other side, and there were two more. In short, every- 

 where, we looked, the dry leaves were rustling and coiling 

 with them ; and we were in despair. In vain we said that 

 they were harmless as kittens, and tried to persuade our- 

 selves that their little bright eyes were pretty, and that 

 their serpentine movements were in the exact line of beauty ; 

 for the life of us, we could not help remembering their 

 family name and connections ; we thought of those disa- 

 greeable gentlemen, the anacondas, the rattlesnakes, and the 

 copperheads, and all of that bad line, immediate family 

 friends of the old serpent to whom we are indebted for all 

 the mischief that is done in this world. So we were quite 

 apprehensive when we saw how our new neighborhood was 

 infested by them, until a neighbor calmed out fears by 

 telling us that snakes always crawled out of their holes to 

 sun themselves in the spring, and that in a day or two 

 they would all be gone. 



So it proved. It was evident they were all out merely 

 to do their spring shopping, or something that serves with 



