38 
ALMOST HUMAN 
Australian Zoo another python made a similar meal. At the war prices 
of such commodities, it is certainly cheaper to install heating services in 
snakes’ houses than risk such costly meals. 
Among the throng that visited the pythons’ cages the week follow- 
ing the publication of this story in “The Leader” was a woman who saw 
Mr. Wilkie attending to one of the houses. She stopped him. 
“Do you belong to the gardens?” 
“Yes.” 
“Have you seen those stories in ‘The Leader’?” 
“Yes.” 
“Do you believe them?” 
“Yes.” 
“Well, I don’t. My husband says the man who tells those yarns is 
the best liar in Australia, But he went and spoilt that blanket yarn. 
Why did he stop with the blankets? Why didn’t he finish the yarn up 
properly, and make the thing swallow the pillows and the bolster and 
the mattress while he was about it? We’d have believed it just as 
easily.” 
“But the python did swallow the blankets,” said Mr. Wilkie, making 
no serious attempt to reveal his identity. 
“Do you mean to tell me that you believe it as well as the fellow that 
told it?” 
“Yes, I do,” was the prompt reply. 
She looked at the unblushing man for a few moments in perplexity. 
“You, a sensible man, believe a snake swallowed a pair of double- 
bed blankets?” 
“Yes; I was here at the time.” 
Mr. Wilkie then patiently explained the habits of such creatures, and 
showed how it was the python imagined he had caught a tender lamb for 
a meal. She listened, and slowly showed signs of conviction. 
“I see it now,” she conceded at last. “But do you believe the stories 
they have been telling in that paper?” 
“I do.” 
“Every word of them?” she demanded. 
“Oh, well,” said the ‘best liar in Australia,’ “You see the lady that 
writes them ” 
“Oh, there’s a woman at the bottom of them, is there? I thought 
so !” 
Mr. Wilkie had intended to explain that as the writer of the stories 
was a minister’s wife they must necessarily bear the stamp of truth ; but 
she would not wait for the completion of the sentence. Why its opening 
conveyed exactly the opposite impression I leave for others to explain. 
