Not far from the giraffe house are the zebras, with their beautiful black and white stripes, looking like wonderfully marked donkeys. They are very wild and untameable and of uncertain temper; it is best not to go too near them. Well, with the zebras we have finished seeing all the well-known animals of the larger kinds, and so we must say good-bye to the Zoo, perhaps to come again another day.
The British Museum is a very wonderful place, so wonderful that few people understand what they see there. They wander along the corridors looking vaguely at the cases of precious and rare objects on every side; they are impressed by the size of the place, but they do not come to the Museum with the idea of looking for anything particular, and they go away without learning anything. No one man, however clever, could understand about all the things that he will find there; and as for a child appreciating even a small part of the treasures there collected, it is impossible. Supposing a very clever man, who had travelled in many foreign countries, had begun while he was still young to gather together all the valuable and curious things he saw to make a little museum, that would be worth seeing; but probably it would be made up of only certain things that that particular man liked and understood. Now, the British Museum is the museum belonging to the nation, and instead of only certain things being collected, there are curious and valuable things belonging to every kind of study. For instance, if you were studying the different nations or wild tribes of the earth, you would find things belonging to various tribes of people in the Museum; or if you were interested in rare old books, you would find more of them at the Museum than anywhere; or if you wanted to find out anything in any branch of study, you would find clever men at the Museum who would help you.
Sometimes a man who has made a collection of interesting things in his lifetime leaves it to the Museum at his death, or perhaps the Museum buys his collection for the nation; and so every year more and more things are accumulated, until the value of the treasures stored in the great building is greater than anyone could imagine. I expect when you have read all this you will say: 'Then do let us go to the Museum. Even if I don't understand, I'd like to see it.'