188 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [Mai., 



moccasins do not deter the family from swimming. One day our 

 whole camp and the male members of the Lee family took a swim 

 at Billy's Lake landing, and soon a moccasin swam from one hummock 

 to another through the party's midst and the snake was captured 

 as well. In another instance one of the small boys came into camp 

 Avith a large dead moccasin in one hand and a live spreading adder 

 in the other. Upon inquiry we found that the boys went in bathing 

 in a small pool 2x6 feet near their house only to find two large 

 moccasins there before them. One they killed, the other escaped. 

 These side lights which we would think make life precarious shows 

 how the natives view existence in such an environment. None 

 of our specimens is more than 6| inches in circumference, but the 

 Lees assert that they reach 9 or 10 inches or even more. This 

 snake is dangerous, pugnacious and ill-natured if tormented or 

 pinned beneath a log or pushed into a corner, and care needs to be 

 exercised after your game is supposedly dead, for the striking pro- 

 pensity is one of the last to leave the reflexive dead reptile. As 

 one member of the party, a hater of snakes, said, "After it is dead, 

 give it two more licks for safety's sake." 



Breeding. — This snake is ovoviviparous. Two females taken 

 June 10 and 22, 1912, respectively, each (Nos. 6,131, 6,130) had 5 

 embryos not far advanced. Another taken June 12, 1912 (No. 

 6,127), had IQ embryos in about the same stage, and another specimen 

 (No. 6,213) taken between July 15 and November 1, 1912, had 5 

 embryos, some of which were not far from hatching. 



Food. — The food of this species is considered to be fish, frogs and 

 other aquatic animals. They seek the transient pools of the islands 

 for stranded killifishes and tadpoles. One individual had a young 

 soft-shelled turtle {Platijpeltis ferox) in its stomach and others 

 fish remains. The other individuals had each a frog (Rana sp.) in the 

 stomach. 



Parasites. — Several of the snakes had in the stomach and intes- 

 tines parasites among the food and at other times the parasites 

 alone. In fact, only the spreading adder excelled it in the number 

 of specimens with parasites, six of the sixteen moccasins having 

 them and these six being } of all the snakes thus afflicted. 



19. Sistrurus miliarius (Linnseus): Ground Rattler; Ground Rattlesnake; Small Rattlesnake; 

 Pigmy Rattlesnake; Southern Pigmy Rattlesnake. 



One specimen was taken May 31, 1912, four specimens from 

 July 15-November 1, 1912, by the Lees, and another September, 

 1913, by Prof. J. C. Bradley and Paul Battle. 



