ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 
173 
Indian Ratel kills rats and eats them with the greatest 
. avidity. There is another cage at the opposite side of 
the road generally occupied by a Ratel, as the occupant 
of the larger cage steadily refuses to have a companion 
of either sex. 
The visitor should, now proceed to the large circular 
house to his left, and, in so doing, he will pass 
The Mongoose Cage, 
which contains two specimens of the Banded Mongoose 
of Africa, Herpestes striata , which have taken the place 
of a very tame example of the Mongoose of Bengal* 
Herpestes auropiinctatus. Recently the Committee have 
brought together largg collections of Indian Mongooses 
for exportation to New Zealand and Australia, where the 
attempt is being made, at their suggestion, to introduce 
the Mongoose for the purpose of destroying and thus 
keeping down the immense numbers of rabbits that now 
threaten the sheep industry of these two countries. 
The Mongoose should be much appreciated in India as 
it attacks snakes, even the most formidable poisonous 
species, and invariably attempts to destroy them. There 
is no more exciting and interesting scene than to see a 
Cobra, or a powerful Russell’s Viper tackled by a 
Mongoose. The tactics of the animal seem to be to 
seize the Cobra by the front of the head ; the Cobra 
rises to strike with distended hood, the Mongoose stand¬ 
ing in front on the alert, and no sooner does the reptile 
strike downwards at him than the head is grasped, 
dragged down, and held to the ground with a bull-dog 
tenacity of purpose, and shaken as a terrier does a rat. 
When the Mongoose is exhausted he loosens his grasp 
