Nevertheless, after some research I learnt enough of snake nature to feel safe in proceeding with my book of Adventures, and in presenting it to a publisher.
‘As a gift-book no one would look at it, and as an educational work there would be no demand for it,’ was its encouraging reception.
This was about ten years ago; and so far from inducing me to relinquish the subject, I began to aspire to become a means of assisting to overcome these prejudices. For the space of two years the anticipated ‘sequel’ to my American Pets went the round of the London publishers of juvenile works, and to several in Scotland. It was read by many of them, who professed to have been unexpectedly and ‘extremely interested’ in it—‘but’—none could be persuaded to ‘entertain so repulsive a subject.’ One member of a publishing house distinguished for the high standard of its literature, positively admitted among his insurmountable objections, that when a child his mother had never permitted him to look through a certain favourite volume late in the day, ‘for fear the pictures of snakes in it should prevent his sleeping!’
An editor of a magazine told me he should lose his subscribers if he put snakes in its pages; and another made excuse that his children would not look at the magazine with a snake in it.
Perhaps this is not so surprising when we reflect that until within a late date snakes in children’s books, if represented at all, are depicted as if with full intent of creating horror. They are represented with enormously extended jaws, and—by comparison with the surrounding trees or bushes—of several hundred feet in length; sometimes extending up a bank or over a hedge into the next field, or winding round a rock or a gnarled trunk, that must be—if the landscape have any pretensions to perspective—a long way off. Slender little tree snakes of two or three feet long are represented winding round and round thick stems and branches strong enough to support you. Into the chasm of a mouth from which an enormous instrument (intended for a tongue) is protruding, a deer the size of a squirrel (by comparison), or a squirrel the size of a mouse, is on the point of running meekly to its doom.
No wonder children ‘skip’ the few pages devoted to snakes in their natural history books, and grow up full of ignorance and prejudices regarding them. In no class of literature are original and conscientious illustrations more required than to replace some of those which reappear again and again, and have passed down from encyclopædias into popular works, conveying the same erroneous impressions to each unthinking reader.
The strongly-expressed opinions of publishers convinced me that the prejudices of adults must first be overcome before children could be persuaded to look at a snake as they would look at a bird or a fish, or to enter the Reptile House at the Zoological Gardens without the premeditated ‘Aughs!’ and ‘Ughs!’ and shudders.
During the two years that witnessed the MS. of Aunt Jenny’s Adventures lying in first one and then another publishing house, an especial occurrence acted as a great stimulant, and induced an almost obstinate persistence in my apparently hopeless studies.
This was the sensation caused by the daily papers in reporting the case of ‘Cockburn versus Mann;’ and the ‘SNAKES IN CHANCERY.’ To the horror and dismay of the ‘general public,’ Mr. Mann, of Chelsea, was represented as ‘keeping for his amusement all manner of venomous serpents;’ or, as another paper put it, ‘Mr. Mann had a peculiar penchant for keeping as domestic pets a large number of venomous snakes.’ (I copy verbatim from the papers of that date.) That these ‘water vipers and puff adders’ were ‘apt to stray in search of freedom;’ or, ‘being accustomed to take their walks abroad,’ had strayed into the neighbours’ gardens, to the terror of maid-servants and children;’ and were ‘now roaming up and down Cheyne Walk,’ and ‘turning the College groves into a garden of Eden.’ So an action was brought against Mr. Mann: for the neighbours decided that ‘there was no better remedy for a stray cobra than a suit in Chancery.’ ‘Everybody’ during July 1872 was reading those delightfully sensational articles, and asking, ‘Have you heard about Mr. Mann’s cobras?’
Mr. Frank Buckland was brave enough to venture into the dangerous precincts of Cheyne Walk, and even into the house of Mr. Mann, to test the virtues and vices of both the ‘pets’ and their possessors. He finally tranquillized the public mind by publishing accounts of his visit, affirming that not one of the snakes was venomous, but, on the contrary, were charmingly interesting and as tame as kittens. The testimony of so popular an authority served not only to allay local terrors, but to modify the sentence that might otherwise have been passed on the ophiophilist, who was merely cautioned by the honourable judge to keep his pets within due bounds.