THE FUN OF SEEING THINGS 
'45 
A Friendly Snake. 
BY ALFRED O. PHILIPP, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS. 
All snakes are not poisonous. In 
fact the great majority of our North 
American forms are not only nonven- 
omous but are actually beneficial to 
the farmer inasmuch as they annually 
destroy innumerable agricultural pests. 
The specimen in this picture is a 
THE FUN OF REALLY SEEING AN INTEREST- 
ING PET. 
large indigo snake ( Spilotcs corals), 
commonly called the “blue bull.” A 
little girl is holding him to be photo- 
graphed with as little fear as she would 
have in handling a kitten. This snake 
is but one of my many pets, and al- 
though he has his own nest in an old 
suit case he roams about my house at 
will. He is friendly and apparently 
enjoys being picked up and fondled, 
but he frequently shows an aversion 
towards certain persons and quickly 
squirms away from them. In all my 
years of experience with reptiles I have 
never known one of these snakes to 
attempt to bite a human being. To see 
a full-grown adult rush frantically on 
a small harmless snake and crush him 
into pulp with a club is not only a 
ridiculous spectacle but a decidedly 
cowardly act. 
Rattlesnakes, cottonmouth mocca- 
sins, copperheads and coral snakes are 
absolutely the only venomous snakes 
you will ever find in the United States. 
There is seldom an intelligent excuse 
for killing any of the harmless species. 
Live and let live. Even the deadly 
rattlesnake strikes only upon provoca- 
tion and merely asks to be left in peace. 
Walking With Eyes and Ears. 
We all walk with our feet, and some 
of us walk with our eyes and ears. 
Mere walking with the feet is a splen- 
did exhilaration. “Give me health and 
a day and I will make the pomp of 
emperors ridiculous.” Ten long miles 
over hill and valley, with the wild 
brush of an autumn wind, make the 
cheeks and the spirit glow until the 
whole of life seem an ample region of 
contentment. 
But the exhilaration of walking with 
eyes and ears is far beyond the pleas- 
ure of walking with the muscles alone. 
What a rich and pregnant sentence is 
that of Theophile Gautier: “I am a 
man for whom the visible world 
exists.” How fully it suggests a man 
whose eyes and thoughts are open to 
the quick succession of images and 
impressions, who find endless pleasure 
in the shifting spectacle of animate and 
inanimate nature, and who can never 
be bored or wearied so long as he can 
forget himself in the quivering intens- 
ity of diversion with which the visible 
world provides him. 
Take the walk in city streets. Some 
persons pass hastily, as if their eyes 
were shut and their souls fastened to a 
tormenting or enchanting vision with- 
in. Some unthread most curious mat- 
ter from the Babel of sounds. Others 
are enraptured with the bright, con- 
trasted stream of color that flows 
round them. Others are alive every 
moment to the faces — faces quite un- 
known, yet revealing brief, fascinating 
visions of laughter or despair, of love 
or hate, of stupidity or cruelty or un- 
achieved aspiration or illuminating 
hope. 
And the walk in the fields ! It is 
merry and restful to tired nerves. But 
how full of revelation and wonder it is 
to those who have learned to walk 
