26- 
LIZARDS AND CROCODILES AT 
THE ZOO. 
It is hardly matter for surprise that the colubrine 
snakes, with their gorgeous colouring and wonderful 
form, or the poisonous cobras, rattlesnakes, and puff- 
adders which inhabit the closed cases in the Reptile 
House at the Zoo, excite more interest and comment 
among visitors than the four-footed reptiles, ranging 
from the alligators of South America to the tiny 
“ gecko” lizards of Southern Europe, which have 
their abode under the same roof. Yet there is some- 
thing peculiarly interesting in these modern survivors 
of the ancient saurians which swarmed in the hot and 
steaming waters of a prehistoric world, and seem, 
like the elephants and rhinoceroses, to carry the 
imagination back to the circumstances and surround- 
ings of a previous though still more ancient era. It 
may, perhaps, be taken as evidence of the unfitness 
of such survivals for modern times, that the only 
inhabitants of the Reptile House which seem to 
invite unqualified dislike and disgust are the crocodiles 
and alligators which swarm in the large oval tank 
