NOTES ON SNAKES COLLECTED IN CANNANORE. 311 



Enhy&rina Valakadyen. 



Of the 29 specimens collected, the sex is not recorded in 16. Of the 

 remainder there were 5 males and 8 females. Three of the latter were 

 mothers, with young in an advanced state of development, and in the 

 aaorregate these contained 19 foetus, of which 7 were males and 12 

 females, so that the latter appear to predominate. 



It appeared to be equally common near the shores throughout the 

 whole year. I could have obtained them in bucketfuls at any time, 

 but had to discourage the fishermen from bringing them in on account 

 ©f expense in rewards. 



The few specimens that had fed contained fish only, and it was a 

 matter of daily occurrence for sepoys and others fishing off the rocks 

 to pull up their lines with one of these snakes wriggling on the hook. 

 I had 4 pregnant females, on dates indicating that the young 4 — 9 in 

 number are discharged about January and February. The young were 

 suspended in a pellucid, viscid, fluid, resembling castor oil in colour, 

 and consistency, overlying a mass of yolk, and encapsuled in flaccid, 

 capacious, and completely transparent thin -walled chambers, bearing no 

 resemblance to the eggs of any other snakes I have seen. The embryos 

 were coiled spirally, and occupied that region of the chambers nearest 

 to the vertebral column, and those of the most advanced brood measured 

 from 10| — 11 inches. These lived for some minutes after liberation 

 from their enveloping membranes, during which the pulsations of the 

 heart were very obvious. Placed in spirit the males extruded their 

 genitals in the act of dying. 



It is evidently of a peaceful disposition. I never excited one to 

 strike at or bite any offending object, and none of the many soldiers 

 and others who habitually bathed in the sea, where they were very 

 plentiful, were ever bitten. 



It is extremely tenacious of life, and is most difficult to kill. 

 I kept some specimens alive for ten days, and many left their 

 ghurrahs of water and wandered for days about the flower-pots 

 in a sunken verandah. It was able to make some progression 

 on land in a heavy laboured way. My largest specimen was 4 

 feet, 7 inches. The smallest pregnant female measured 3 feet 2 

 inches. The females had a much deeper conformation of body than the 

 males. The male claspers were bifid on each side as in vipers, they 

 were villose, and had a median raphe posteriorly which divided and 



