HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



65 



MATERNAL INSTINCT. 



WITHOUT desiring to rake up any of the 

 evidence which has been tendered in favour 

 of and adverse to the probability of the viper swallow- 

 ing her young in presence of threatened danger — 

 beyond noting the fact that, while there is no physi- 

 cal obstruction to their being received into the mouth, 

 gullet or stomach, there are certainly no special and 

 exceptional facilities in the structure of those parts to 

 admit of it in the adder, as has been alleged — may 

 not this question be asked : — Supposing it to be 

 proved that such a proceeding does take place, will 

 not that be the only instance in nature of a mother 

 betraying any protective instinct for a brood which 

 do not in any way depend upon her for sub- 

 sistence ? 



Snakes, whether hatched from extruded eggs or 

 produced alive, are ushered into the world in a 

 perfect condition, and are capable of getting their 

 own living from the moment of birth. If we except 

 slight pigmentary changes in the skin, and the addi- 

 tional development of certain appendages, such as 

 the rattle, the organs and the function in the infant 

 snakeling differ in nowise from those of its parent, 

 beyond mere capacity. Even venomous species enter 

 upon life with a supply of ammunition all ready, and 

 need no training or experience to put it to its proper 

 use. The little nose-horned vipers which were born 

 at the Zoological Gardens last winter killed mice 

 before they had seen the light twelve hours ; and I 

 have known rattlesnakes within three hours of their 

 birth knock over young rats as though they had been 

 shot. Little boas and pythons, too, begin to feed in 

 a similarly short space of time, doubling up their 

 quarry as artistically as the adult of thirty feet ; and 

 newly-hatched grass and other serpents of the ovo- 

 viviparous persuasion have been observed to take 

 tadpoles almost immediately, without involving any 

 maternal interference. 



In no other part of the world, as far as I have been 

 able to discover, does such a theory obtain with 

 regard to any snake — nor, indeed, with regard to any 

 reptile, except that the Indians on the banks of the 

 Orinoco declare that the female jacare or alligator 

 keeps her young under shelter of ledges and caves in 

 the rocks and disgorges her half-digested food for their 

 benefit ; which, considering that this creature leaves 

 her eggs in the sand to be hatched by the heat of the 

 sun, certainly displays a degree of wisdom on her part 

 equal to that of the oft-quoted wise child which 

 knows its own father ! The common viper is so diffi- 

 cult to keep alive in confinement, that no opportunity 

 has hitherto occurred of settling this vexed question in 

 menageries ; four were born in the Reptilium at the 

 Zoo ten years ago, but did not survive long enough 

 to afford any criterion, and died unswallowed. 

 Russell's vipers, moccassins, and seven-banded snakes 



have bred there on several occasions ; two batches of 

 hybrids between the Jamaica yellow-snake and a 

 female pale-headed tree-boa were produced ; a large 

 family of common boas made their appearance in the 

 summer of 1877 ; and water vipers, nose-horned 

 vipers, common rattlesnakes, yellow boas and ringed 

 snakes have all been born there. But in the case of 

 none of these has the slightest indication of maternal 

 instinct been shown by the mother, nor have I been 

 able to perceive a trace of anything of the sort in the 

 horrid rattlesnake and others of my own which have 

 given birth to young. The fact that parturient 

 serpents are unusually savage, need scarcely, I think, 

 be taken into account in dealing with this considera- 

 tion. It was stated some years ago that a brood of 

 young smooth snakes, born in captivity, were wont 

 to rush to the mother and take refuge underneath her 

 body when they were disturbed ; but whether there 

 was anything else in the cage for them to take refuge 

 under did not appear. Viviparous lizards occasion- 

 ally swallow their young, but do so from pure alimen- 

 tary motives, without any intention of restoring them 

 to society, and one can conceive of cannibal elapidse, 

 like the hamadryad and chequered snake, acting in a 

 similar manner ; lizards, however, betray no concern 

 for the welfare of their offspring, and it seems strange 

 that if so defenceless a creature as a new-born slow- 

 worm is left to fight its own battles, such elaborate 

 provision should be made for the safety of little 

 veneniferous beings so much better qualified to take 

 care of themselves. 



In those curious and undoubtedly anomalous in- 

 stances of incubation which have been observed 

 among ovo-viviparous ophidians, an exemplification 

 of something approaching this instinct has been 

 manifested in the violent resentment shown by the 

 serpent when the eggs were disturbed, and the per- 

 tinacity with which she has adhered to her task. A 

 grass-snake in this condition bit my hand as I was 

 taking her temperature ; and to those who are ac- 

 quainted with the character of this reptile, no better 

 proof could be afforded of the intense revolution 

 which its nature must have undergone. 



A remarkable variation of maternal intuition came 

 under my notice in Nicaragua. Some alligator's eggs 

 had been substituted for the legitimate contents of a 

 hen's nest, and the deluded fowl continued to sit on 

 them until they were hatched. (Alligator's egg s 

 have a hard shell, and are very little bigger than a 

 hen's — much smaller than one would expect.) No 

 words can describe the surprise and astonishment 

 depicted by that hen, as she surveyed the strange 

 chickens. For several hours she pondered over 

 them, never clucking, and making no effort to scratch 

 food for them ; then, finding no solution of the puzzle, 

 she gave it up and beat them to pieces. 



Arthur Stradling, C.M.Z.S. 



29, Woodford Road, Watford. 



