56 MAY 



came to receive the compliments of the company. 

 He did not appear to have had a bite, but I 

 watched him for the next hour, as he lay resting 

 with an expression of intense satisfaction on his 

 face. Nothing however happened, and it was a 

 wonderful escape. We never can prevent him from 

 going after snakes ; no calling will stop him and I 

 very much fear some day he will get bitten, when 

 of course it will be certain death in fifteen or 

 twenty minutes. 



If we could only get rid of the snakes ; but 

 how ? We are not sure that they are between the 

 walls, and nothing can be seen of them by looking 

 in. I only know that that is the quarter in which 

 they prowl ; along a range of go-downs. One came 

 into the washerman's go-down once. He sprang up 

 on the ironing-table, and the venomous thing sat 

 up and hissed at him, and then disappeared down a 

 hole in the wall. We speedily bricked that hole 

 up, and there it may be now perhaps ! Another 

 time, old Grey Beard saw one in the kitchen in the 

 early morning, with its head in a saucer of milk. 

 It is not a nice idea ; cobras in the kitchen, lapping 

 up the milk ! 



