492 SNAKES. 



their escape were still within the parent. At the time when 

 a controversy on the viper question was going on, Mr. 

 Edward Newman edited the Zoologist, and he himself 

 related a most confirmatory case of this viviparous lizard. 

 A gentleman who was collecting, caught one with two young 

 ones ; all three were consigned to his pocket vasadum. On 

 reaching home the two young ones had disappeared, and the 

 mother looked in such goodly condition that he thought she 

 must have made a meal of her offspring. Next morning, 

 behold ! there were the two little ones and their devoted 

 parent all safe and sound. She had sheltered them within 

 her body ! And, as Mr. Newman added, ' the narrators are 

 of that class who do know what to observe and hovv' to 

 observe it.' 



In May 1865 a clergyman in Norfolk communicated to 

 Science Gossip that he had seen six or seven young vipers 

 run helter-skelter down their mother's throat. He killed 

 the parent and ' out came the little ones.' In July another 

 correspondent of the same paper saw several young vipers 

 vanish in a like manner, adding, ' By the way the mother 

 opened her mouth to receive them, he would say they were 

 accustomed to that sort of thing.' Mr. J. H. Gurney 

 recorded that a viper with young ones was disturbed, when 

 two of the latter ran into her open mouth, the second one 

 after getting half in wriggling out again. The viper was cut 

 open to seek a reason for this, when a recently swallowed 

 mouse was found stopping up the way. The first had 

 managed to get into safe quarters, but the second could not 

 pass. 



In Oct. 1 866 the question was revived by Mr. Thomas 



