THE TAIL OF A SNAKE. 185 



lateral. As closely as their body can be coiled on a given 

 space, as close as a ribbon or a rope, they can curl themselves 

 round sideways, that is, with the ventral scales all prone to 

 the ground, and the vertebral column upwards ; nor could 

 they, from the construction of their spine, coil themselves 

 similarly in a vertical position, as a hedgehog and a dormouse 

 roll themselves up. But temporarily and partially they can 

 bend themselves vertically ; for you see a snake often with a 

 part of its body raised vertically against a wall, while the 

 rest is horizontally along the ground, and consequently one 

 part is at right angles with the other part, and as the creature 

 rises against the wall every joint has in turn taken this position. 

 Also, when coiled round a branch, you do occasionally see 

 that the curves are not invariably and unexceptionally lateral, 

 but sometimes vertical, although not so closely so as in the 

 more natural coils. I have very narrowly observed this, 

 because the * hoop '-like motion is often ridiculed ; but it 

 seems a not impossible action when a large circle is described 

 by the body, though close coils would be less possible.-^ 



A clergyman of Australia had a narrow escape from one 

 of these 'rolling' creatures. His daughter gave me an 

 account of the circumstance, she also, when a resident there, 

 having been well acquainted with such scenes. Her father 

 accidentally trod on one of those dangerous serpents, which 

 immediately made a spring at him, but which he expertly 



' Since the above was in type, I have on several occasions observed vertical 

 coils in constricting snakes. Twice a python constricted an animal in distinct 

 vertical coils. I drtw the attention of Keeper Tyrrell to this, and we were both 

 convinced that no lateral coils whatever were used. On another occasion, while 

 Mr. Elwes was studying the action of Elaphis qitater-radiatus for the illustra- 

 tion, p. 205, its coils were entirely vertical, not lateral. 



