THE PELAGIC OR SEA SNAKES. 241 



pursuing fish, many of them of bright colouring, they offer 

 constant amusement to the beholder. Sometimes, when 

 the sailors are throwing their nets, they disappear beneath 

 the waves, and are no longer seen for half an hour or 

 more ; when presently, far away from the spot where they 

 vanished so suddenly, up they come to the surface again, 

 to sport once more, or take in a fresh supply of air. 



Pity they possess such evil qualities to blind us to their 

 beauties, for they rank among the most venomous of 

 serpents. They belong to the sub-order of venomous 

 colubrine snakes, or Opliidia colubrifonnes Venenosi, those 

 which outwardly have the aspect of harmless snakes, while 

 yet furnished with poison fangs. In the chapter on Denti- 

 tion, these distinctions, facilitated by the illustrations, are 

 more fully explained ; here it need only be said that though 

 they have smaller jaws and shorter fangs than many other 

 venomous snakes of their size, the virus is plentiful, and 

 so active that the danger from the bite is great. All the 

 pelagic serpents have also a few simple teeth behind the 

 fangs ; therefore, as Fayrer warns the natives, it does not 

 do to trust to the appearance of the wound, which, though . 

 looking like the bite of a harmless snake, would demand 

 immediate remedies. A certain conviction of dancrer is 

 that the bite being Inflicted in salt water, would leave no 

 doubt as to the nature of the snake. Even a painless 

 wound it is not safe to trust ; and Sir Joseph Fayrer gives 

 several such warnings among his cases of bite from sea 

 snakes, two of which I will quote. 



Captain S , while bathing in a tidal river, felt what 



he thought was the pinch of a crab on his leg, but took no 



Q 



