The serpents were motionless in their glass house, and lay, half-asleep, curled around the trunks of trees. In the evening by lamp-light they become lively, and then, twisting about and flashing forth their snaky splendors, they present a fine spectacle. The snake-room, with its walls of glass, behind which the snakes live, reminded me of the old northern myth of Nastrond, the roof of which was woven of snakes' backs, the final home of the ungodly--an unpleasant, but vigorous picture. The most disagreeable and the ugliest of all the snakes, was that little snake which the beautiful Queen Cleopatra, herself false as a serpent, placed at her breast; a little gray, flat-headed snake which liked to bury itself in the sand.
The monkey-family lead a sad life; stretch out their hands for nuts or for bread, with mournful human gestures; contentious, beaten, oppressed, thrust aside, frightening one another, the stronger the weaker--mournfully human also.
Sad, also, was the sight of an ourang-outang, spite of all its queer grimaces, solitary in its house, for it evidently suffered ennui, was restless, and would go out. It embraced its keeper and kissed him with real human tenderness. The countenance, so human, yet without any human intelligence, made a painful impression upon me; so did the friendly tame creature here, longing for its fellows, and seeing around it only human beings. Thou poor animal! Fain would I have seen thee in the primeval woods of Africa, caressing thy wife in the clear moonlight of the tropical night, sporting with her among the branches of the trees, and sleeping upon them, rocked by the warm night wind. There thy ugliness would have had a sort of picturesque beauty. After the strange beast-man had climbed hither and thither along the iron railing, seizing the bars with his hands, and feet which resembled hands, and also with his teeth, he took a white woolen blanket, wrapped it around him in a very complicated manner, and ended by laying himself down as a human being might do, in his chilly, desolate room.
After this, all the more charming was the spectacle presented by the water-fowl from every zone--Ducks, Swans, and Co., all quite at home here, swimming in the clear waters, among little green islands on which they had their little huts. It was most charmingly pretty and complete. And the mother-duck with her little, lively golden-yellow flock, swimming neck and heels after her, or seeking shelter under her wings, is at all times one of the most lovely scenes of natural life--resembling humanity in a beautiful manner.