"Eight, I think, and each one has a history; and two or three of them a mystery, which he refuses to divulge. But here we are at the end of our journey, and Fannie hasn't had an opportunity to open her mouth."
"It's probably very good for my tongue to get a rest; it works quite steadily as a usual thing—at least so my father says. But if Ralph hadn't been all eyes, this would have been dull for him."
"I isn't all eyes!" said Ralph, indignantly.
They now approached the entrance to the Zoological Garden, and the girls once more took out their pocket books; but Miss Benton was ahead of them again, and had settled for the party before there was time to demur.
The first thing they spied were the mounds of the prairie dogs, and they stood watching these a long time. It was such fun to see the little animals running in and out of their holes and to hear their funny bark, which Miriam said was "the best part of them, and probably very much better than their bite."
Our little party was fortunate enough to be at the cages of the carnivora just at feeding time. The great lions lay basking in the sun and looking so innocent and amiable that it was almost impossible to imagine they could be at all dangerous, when suddenly the man who fed them appeared with the raw meat. Then their roars were fairly appalling, and made the whole crowd jump, while Ralph clung tight to the hand of Aunt Kitty, who said:
"I was just thinking how nice it would be to pat that quiet, majestic fellow on the head, as I would my Angora cat; but I think I'll wait till he's had his dinner."
"Oh, Aunt Kitty," said Ralph, "I 'ouldn't let you; he'd eat you up!"
It was an exciting but rather terrible pleasure to see the wild creatures quarreling and growling and fighting over their dinners, and was also a most effective object lesson on greediness.
Like other visitors, although Miss Kitty laughed at them for it, our little party followed the keeper around from one cage to another as he fed the various animals.