als, and also many other wonderful things,
and made us see animal life in altogether a new way. When you are a
little older you will find many things of great interest in Darwin's
books. Upstairs on one side is a gallery full of humming-birds, tiny
birds some of them, no bigger than butterflies, and as brilliant as
jewels, red and blue and green and yellow. It must be wonderful to see
them flashing about in their native land and hovering over the gorgeous
flowers; but here, so many together in one case, they lose half their
beauty, and they lack the sunshine to bring out their lovely colours.
There is also a gallery full of pressed flowers, and here you can learn
anything about flowers, leaves, and seeds; and on the other side there
is one full of stuffed animals. Now, we have seen the living animals at
the Zoo, and we do not care to see the dead ones here so much, though we
can just glance around it. But there is one animal you must see, because
there is no living animal like it in the Zoo.

This is a new animal called the okapi, only discovered during the last
fifty years in the dense forests of Africa, and its skin was stuffed and
set up and is now here. One would have thought that all the animals now
living would have been known long ago, and it seems almost ridiculous
to speak of a 'new' animal; but this one was new to us. He is very much
like a mixture of several other animals. He is about the size of a large
antelope, and he has a long upper lip like a giraffe, and a meek,
patient face. His back slopes down like a giraffe's, too, and his body
is a reddish colour like that of a cow; but his hind-legs are striped
like a zebra. Now, what do you think of that for a new animal? You or I
might have invented something more original. It is just as if he had
been round to the other animals, and said: 'Please, I want to live. Will
you give me something?' And the antelope had said: 'Well, you may be
rather like me in size, but don't make yourself a shape that anyone
could mistake for me.' So the poor, meek okapi had made himself the
colour and size of the antelope, but had taken the sloping back of a
giraffe; and then he had gone to the antelope, and said: 'Will this do?'
And the antelope had not been altogether pleased, and he had said:
'Humph! I'm not sure if it will; you've taken my colour, too. Some fool
might think you were me at a distance.' So the meek okapi had added a
few stripes on his legs, like a zebra, just to m