Some of the reasons offered for the old system of snake-feeding were themselves truly reptilian. “We follow God’s ordinances, and they must be right,” was the reverent remark of a keeper; and humanitarians were told that “to declare the use of live food to be cruel is to bring that charge against the Designer of Nature Himself.” So deep and fervent was the piety of the Reptile House! Nevertheless, we continued to urge our point, and the subject was hotly debated at more than one of the Zoological Society’s annual meetings, where, as a result of the protests raised by Captain Alfred Carpenter, R.N., Mr. Stephen Coleridge, Mr. Rowland Hunt, and other F.Z.S.’s, it was made evident that the majority of the Fellows, who regarded the Society as a sort of private club, were indignant at public opinion being brought to bear upon their concerns. It was a situation not devoid of humour. I happen to know that in the course of an excited meeting held in November, 1907, when the Duke of Bedford, as President of the Zoological Society, was in the chair, the following telegram was despatched to his Grace: Beg you to stand firm for live food and maintain the ordinances of the Creator. _From_ ANNA CONDA. This artless prayer of an unknown lady was fully in accord with the spirit of the meeting. Nevertheless, things moved, even in Regent’s Park; and, when we had shown that the snakes in the New York Zoological Park were successfully fed on freshly-killed animals, we had the satisfaction of seeing the same less barbarous method adopted at the London “Zoo.” I once had the advantage of hearing some of the inner history of a large menagerie from the wife of one of the keepers, a charwoman in the house where I was staying, who was of a somewhat loquacious and communicative disposition, the staple of her talk being the adventures of her husband, Johnnie. “Johnnie came home dead-tired last night, sir,” she said on one occasion. “Why was that, Mrs. Smith?” I asked. “Why, sir, he had had to beat the elephant; and after that he was too stiff and tired to take his supper.” My natural inquiry whether the elephant had been able to take _his_ supper was set aside as frivolous. Knowing something of the profound piety of the keepers at the (London) “Zoo” in relation to snake-feeding, I was pained to learn from this good woman that her husband, who, unfortunately, was not employed in a reptile-department, had “lost his faith,” and for a reason which I think has not before been recorded among the many modern causes of unbelief. “You see, sir, Johnny can never again hold with the Church, after the way he’s seen clergymen going on with girls in the elephant house.”