One peculiar thing I noticed immediately I came into it; and that was what a lot of birds there were about.  Every tree seemed to have two or three nests in it.  And heaps of other wild creatures appeared to be making themselves at home there, too.  Stoats and tortoises and dormice seemed to be quite common, and not in the least shy.  Toads of different colors and sizes hopped about the lawn as though it belonged to them.  Green lizards (which were very rare in Puddleby) sat up on the stones in the sunlight and blinked at us.  Even snakes were to be seen.

“You need not be afraid of them,” said the Doctor, noticing that I started somewhat when a large black snake wiggled across the path right in front of us.  “These fellows are not poisonous.  They do a great deal of good in keeping down many kinds of garden-pests.  I play the flute to them sometimes in the evening.  They love it.  Stand right up on their tails and carry on no end.  Funny thing, their taste for music.”

“Why do all these animals come and live here?” I asked.  “I never saw a garden with so many creatures in it.”

“Well, I suppose it’s because they get the kind of food they like; and nobody worries or disturbs them.  And then, of course, they know me.  And if they or their children get sick I presume they find it handy to be living in a doctor’s garden—­Look!  You see that sparrow on the sundial, swearing at the blackbird down below?  Well, he has been coming here every summer for years.  He comes from London.  The country sparrows round about here are always laughing at him.  They say he chirps with such a Cockney accent.  He is a most amusing bird—­very brave but very cheeky.  He loves nothing better than an argument, but he always ends it by getting rude.  He is a real city bird.  In London he lives around St. Paul’s Cathedral.  ‘Cheapside,’ we call him.”

“Are all these birds from the country round here?” I asked.

“Most of them,” said the Doctor.  “But a few rare ones visit me every year who ordinarily never come near England at all.  For instance, that handsome little fellow hovering over the snapdragon there, he’s a Ruby-throated Humming-bird.  Comes from America.  Strictly speaking, he has no business in this climate at all.  It is too cool.  I make him sleep in the kitchen at night.  Then every August, about the last week of the month, I have a Purple Bird-of-Paradise come all the way from Brazil to see me.  She is a very great swell.  Hasn’t arrived yet of course.  And there are a few others, foreign birds from the tropics mostly, who drop in on me in the course of the summer months.  But come, I must show you the zoo.”

THE TENTH CHAPTER

THE PRIVATE ZOO

I did not think there could be anything left in that garden which we had not seen.  But the Doctor took me by the arm and started off down a little narrow path and after many windings and twistings and turnings we found ourselves before a small door in a high stone wall.  The Doctor pushed it open.