“Mischievous, too,” said Adam, “that Iguanadon.  You couldn’t keep anything out of his reach.  We used to forbid animals of his kind to enter the garden, but that didn’t bother him; he’d stand up on his hind-legs and reach over and steal anything he’d happen to want.”

“I could have used him for a fire-escape,” said Mr. Barnum; “and as for my inability to provide him with quarters, I’d have met that problem after a short while.  I’ve always lamented the absence, too, of the Megalosaurus—­”

“Which simply shows how ignorant you are,” retorted Noah.  “Why, my dear fellow, it would have taken the whole of an ordinary zoo such as yours to give the Megalosaurus a lunch.  Those fellows would eat a rhinoceros as easily as you’d crack a peanut.  I did have a couple of Megalosaurians on my boat for just twenty-four hours, and then I chucked them both overboard.  If I’d kept them ten days longer they’d have eaten every blessed beast I had with me, and your Zoo wouldn’t have had anything else but Megalosaurians.”

“Papa is right about that, Mr. Barnum,” said Shem.  “The whole Saurian tribe was a fearful nuisance.  About four hundred years before the flood I had a pet Creosaurus that I kept in our barn.  He was a cunning little devil—­full of tricks, and all that; but we never could keep a cow or a horse on the place while he was about.  They’d mysteriously disappear, and we never knew what became of ’em until one morning we surprised Fido in—­”

“Surprised who?” asked Doctor Johnson, scornfully.

“Fido,” returned Shem. “’That was my Creosaurus’s name.”

“Lord save us!  Fido!” cried Johnson.  “What a name for a Creosaurus!”

“Well, what of it?” asked Shem, angrily.  “You wouldn’t have us call a mastodon like that Fanny, would you, or Tatters?”

“Go on,” said Johnson; “I’ve nothing to say.”

“Shall I send for a physician?” put in Boswell, looking anxiously at his chief, the situation was so extraordinary.

Solomon and Carlyle giggled; and the Doctor having politely requested Boswell to go to a warmer section of the country, Shem resumed.

“I caught him in the act of swallowing five cows and Ham’s favorite trotter, sulky and all.”

Baron Munchausen rose up and left the room.

“If they’re going to lie I’m going to get out,” he said, as he passed through the room.

“What became of Fido?” asked Boswell.

“The sulky killed him,” returned Shem, innocently.  “He couldn’t digest the wheels.”

Noah looked approvingly at his son, and, turning to Barnum, observed, quietly: