SERPENTS 
the chimney, and by squeezing between the saucepan and 
fire-place had turned over the former, thereby nearly 
putting out the fire and swamping the place. Mrs. J 
was a lady not to be unnerved by trifles, she had been 
from birth used to wild beasts, so looking with an ex- 
perienced eye up the chimney, she espied the object of her 
search. The end of the reptile’s tail was hanging quietly 
in the corner of the flat recess just above the fire-place (so 
common in old houses), which had been selected by this 
scaly monster as a secure resting-place, quite warm and, 
no doubt, comfortable to his cold body. 
No sooner seen than taken in hand, for a strong and 
courageous woman will sometimes in an emergency act as 
coolly and determinedly as the most daring of the other 
sex ; so down she pulled, in sailor-like fashion, this monster 
boa until the neck was in sight, at this she grasped just 
below the head, and into his box she tumbled him. 
COBRAS. 
The following is an account of the death of the keeper, 
Girling, caused by a bite from a cobra. Girling at the time 
(October 2, 1852) was keeper in the Zoological Society’s 
reptile-house. From the testimony of his fellow-keeper. 
Girling had been out all night drinking, although when 
he returned to his duty in the morning his condition w'as 
not observed. Soon after he entered the room he terrified 
his assistant by taking from the cage the Indian cobra, 
holding it up and telling his companion that he was 
inspired. He held the serpent before his face, when with 
a lightning-like dart the beast struck him with his poison 
fangs across the nose and between the eyes, inflicting 
several punctured wounds. He instantly threw the snake 
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