that every moving thing goes about in dread of losing its life from
something else which either preys upon or persecutes it. The
house-sparrow, the most domestic of wild birds, gives a look-out for
squalls between every peck, but it will soon learn to distinguish the
person who does not molest and who feeds it, even to coming at his call,
while fish, those most cold-blooded of creatures, which in an ordinary
way go off like a silver flash at the sight of a shadow, will grow so
familiar that they will rise to the surface and touch the white
finger-tips placed level with the water.

So Dexter sat smiling and almost without movement among his subjects,
with the rabbits begging, the mice coming and going, now feeding and now
taking a friendly walk up his legs and about his chest, and the squirrel
bounding to him from time to time after nuts, which were carried up to
the beam overhead, and there rasped through with its keen teeth, the rat
the while watching it from the floor till furnished with another nut, as
it had pounced upon one the squirrel dropped.

There was yet another pet--one which had been very sluggish all through
the winter, but now in fine sunshiny days fairly active, and ready upon
this occasion to come forth and be fed.

Dexter rose very slowly, talking gently the while to the mice, which he
coaxed to his hand with a piece of cheese, and then placed them upon the
floor, while he went to a corner where, turned upside down upon a slate,
stood one of Dan'l's large flower-pots, the hole being covered with a
piece of perforated zinc.

The pot was lifted, slate and all, turned over, and the slate lifted
off, to display quite a nest of damp moss, which, as the boy watched,
seemed for a few minutes uninhabited, but all at once it began to heave
in one part; there was an increasing movement, as if something was
gliding through it, and then from among the soft moss a smooth
glistening head with two bright eyes appeared, and a curious little
tongue darted out through an opening between the tightly-closed jaws.

There was no doubt of the nature of the creature, which glided forth
more and more till it developed itself into a snake of a bright olive
green, about thirty inches long, its singular markings and mottlings
looking as bright as if it had been varnished.

Dexter watched the curious horizontal undulating movement of the little
serpent for some time before he touched it, and then taking it up very
gently, i