This is the time for visiting the Reptile House, which otherwise offers but little amusement, as the great snakes have either retired from public life under their blankets, or lie coiled upon the branches of the trees in their dens. Three o’clock is the feeding-time, and the reptiles, which are on the look-out, seem to know full well the errand of the man who enters with the basket, against the side of which they hear the fluttering wings of the feathered victims, and the short stamp of the doomed rabbits. The keeper opens the door at the back of the den of the huge pythons, for these he need not fear, takes off their blanket and drops a rabbit, who hops from side to side, curious to inspect his new habitation, and probably finding it to his taste, sits on his haunches and leisurely begins to wash his face. Silently the python glides over the stones, uncurling his huge folds, looks for an instant upon his unconscious victim, and the next has seized him with his jaws. His contracting folds are twisted as swiftly as a whiplash round his shrieking prey, and for ten minutes the serpent lies still, maintaining his mortal knot until his prey is dead, when seizing it by the ears, he draws it through his vice-like grip, crushing every bone, and elongating the body preparatory to devouring it. The arrangement for feeding the venomous kinds, is, of course, more cautious. The door opens at the top instead of at the side of the dens, and with good reason; for no sooner does the keeper remove with a crooked iron rod, the blanket from the cobra, than the reptile springs with inflated hood into an S-like attitude and darts laterally at his prey, whose sides have scarcely been pierced, when it is seized with tetanic spasms, and lies convulsed in a few seconds. These instantaneous effects, almost as rapid as those of a mortal shot or of lightning itself, might at first sight seem to warrant the conclusion that the genius of evil had formed the venomous serpents to be his chosen agents of destruction; but at a nearer view, they afford but another proof of the beneficence of the Creator in providing weak, sober, and by no means cruel creatures, with a weapon which makes up to them for the want of speed, and at the same times abridges the torments of their victims. Though generally the objects of abhorrence and fear, yet serpents sometimes render themselves useful or agreeable to man. Thus the rat-snake of Ceylon (_Coryphodon Blumenbachii_), in consideration of its services in destroying vermin, is often kept as a household pet, and so domesticated by the natives as to feed at their table.