f the most curious animals in the world. The
giraffes at the Zoo are continually changing, for though some have been
born here, they do not live long, and new ones have to be brought from
Africa at great cost.

Not far from the giraffe house are the zebras, with their beautiful
black and white stripes, looking like wonderfully marked donkeys. They
are very wild and untameable and of uncertain temper; it is best not to
go too near them. Well, with the zebras we have finished seeing all the
well-known animals of the larger kinds, and so we must say good-bye to
the Zoo, perhaps to come again another day.

CHAPTER XXII

THE BRITISH MUSEUM

The British Museum is a very wonderful place, so wonderful that few
people understand what they see there. They wander along the corridors
looking vaguely at the cases of precious and rare objects on every side;
they are impressed by the size of the place, but they do not come to the
Museum with the idea of looking for anything particular, and they go
away without learning anything. No one man, however clever, could
understand about all the things that he will find there; and as for a
child appreciating even a small part of the treasures there collected,
it is impossible. Supposing a very clever man, who had travelled in many
foreign countries, had begun while he was still young to gather together
all the valuable and curious things he saw to make a little museum, that
would be worth seeing; but probably it would be made up of only certain
things that that particular man liked and understood. Now, the British
Museum is the museum belonging to the nation, and instead of only
certain things being collected, there are curious and valuable things
belonging to every kind of study. For instance, if you were studying the
different nations or wild tribes of the earth, you would find things
belonging to various tribes of people in the Museum; or if you were
interested in rare old books, you would find more of them at the Museum
than anywhere; or if you wanted to find out anything in any branch of
study, you would find clever men at the Museum who would help you.

Sometimes a man who has made a collection of interesting things in his
lifetime leaves it to the Museum at his death, or perhaps the Museum
buys his collection for the nation; and so every year more and more
things are accumulated, until the value of the treasures stored in the
great building is greater than anyone could imag