"I heard a story told, one day, which of course was the same thing as reading it. This story was, that a traveller, being once on a journey through a wild country, full of woods and rocks, came by a large cave, in the side of a hill and partly under ground, and for some reason went into it. He found there a horrible looking creature, a woman, as tall as a giant, down to the waist, and the lower part of her a long, monstrously large snake.
"I felt quite frightened, when I heard the story, and all the rest of the day, I couldn't help thinking uneasily of that gigantic woman snake. I was more frightened than ever, when the time came for me to go to bed at night. I slept then in the attic and used to go to bed without a light, for I had never been afraid of the dark. I went pretty slowly, I tell you, till I got to the attic door, and there I stopped awhile, afraid to open it for fear of seeing something horrid. But my father called to me to go to bed instantly. I opened the door, and there I saw the woman snake, part reaching into the dark above. I saw her as plainly, as I see you now, and was terrified almost out of my senses.
"But my father called to me again, and I shut my eyes and rushed up stairs. Of course I didn't hit any thing for there was no such creature there. It was my fright at hearing the story, that made me see what didn't exist.
"Now, Charley, do you think you had better read books, that can have such an effect as that?"
CURIOUS BIRDS
Uncle Brown had in his Museum, a great many Birds, as well as shells. I don't mean living birds, but stuffed birds. In the old countries there is a class of men, who, having been taught how to do it well, make it their regular trade to procure birds, and after having taken off their skins, with all the feathers on, to stuff them with some soft substance. They are exactly as if alive, and of the same size.
There are some of these Taxidermists (as they are called) in this country, though not, I believe, very many. Uncle Brown got most of his birds from Europe, by means of uncle sea-captain, when he came home from his voyages.