Water-snakes generally affect water-courses, often hanging from the branches of trees over streams, into which they drop when disturbed. Dr. Bell, an English naturalist of distinction, once tamed a European species of this genus. This pet could distinguish him among a crowd, and would crawl to him, passing into his sleeve, where it would curl up for a nap. Every morning found it at the doctor’s table for its share of milk. For strangers it had an aversion, flying and hissing at them when any familiarities were attempted. Were these grovelling creatures better known, there would be found much in them to admire and commend. They are not the hideous beings they are represented to be. The feeling of hatred against them, an instinctive and unappeasable enmity, is perfectly natural, and has grown out of religious superstitions. Fear, disgust and aversion are man’s experiences at the sight of a snake, and there is at once a disposition to seize a stick or stone, or to make use of his heel, if well protected, to deal a fatal stroke. War to the death seems to be the cry between the highest of the mammals and the serpent tribe. It is not at all surprising, therefore, that the snake, seeing a human enemy, should either glide hastily off into the bushes, or, being thwarted, should coil itself up and hiss or throw itself forward in attack. Man would do well to protect the snakes about his domains, and treat them as friends, for they do him invaluable service in the destruction of vermin that make havoc with his crops. Ants, bees, spiders, and many fishes, animals that are lower down in the scale than the snake, it is claimed, show far more forecast, ingenuity and architectural ability than it, but asserters of such an opinion forget that the snake is never studied under favorable conditions. Long ages of persecution have made him fearful of man, from whose presence he flees as from a pestilence or scourge, and there is consequently no chance to learn his better nature. Even man, until recently, has shown no inclination to make his acquaintance, being controlled by a dread which it appears well nigh impossible to overcome. Where the animal has been made to partake of the milk of human kindness, and has learned to regard man as a friend and not an enemy, he has shown remarkable susceptibility to culture and enlightenment. Let it be hoped that a modicum of the wisdom which has been attributed to him from the earliest of times, when he was made the object of homage and the insignia of the physician, shall at least be found to remain to the credit of science and truth. HOUSE-BEARING REPTILES.