1852-54 SNAKE-BITE 391 



when he often used to hear that kind of music. 

 Dickens is a handsome man, but much more — 

 there is real goodness and genius in every mark 

 in his face, and the lines in it are very strongly 

 marked. We all took a stroll round the garden 

 by moonlight, before the party left.' 



On October 30, 1852, Owen writes to his 

 sister Catherine : ' I enclose an autograph of 

 Charles Dickens. Keep the cover for your scrap- 

 book, but return me the note. It relates to a little 

 paper I wrote for his " Household Words," on 

 Poison Snakes, a propos of an accident at the 

 Zoological Gardens. A keeper in the snake-room 

 had been drinking farewell to a friend who was 

 going to Australia, and early in the morning 

 entered the snake-room with a few companions. 

 Being a trifle the worse for his potations, he began 

 to act as a snake-charmer, by way of sport — 

 swinging poisonous snakes over his head and so 

 forth. A cobra, highly incensed at this treatment, 

 bit him on the nose. The man was taken imme- 

 diately to the London Hospital, but died within the 

 hour. 



' Dickens brought his wife and wife's sister here 

 last Thursday, and we had Mr. Forster (editor of 

 " Examiner " ) and Mr. Kenyon (a poet), both old 

 friends of his, to meet him. Dickens was very 

 happy and in great force. . . . The diversity of 

 trees and shrubs in our grounds, all decaying after 

 their own fashion, produces a rich contrast and 



