496 SiVAKES. 



stepped back and watched to see what next would happen, 

 when presently some of them came out. He killed the 

 mother, and all the rest ran out.' 



A gentleman in Ohio saw a water snake on a bank. He 

 got a pole, and with one stroke of it wounded her, but not so 

 much as to disable her. She instantly made for the water, 

 swam about her own length, when she 'wheeled round' with 

 difficulty, and placing her under jaw just above the level of 

 the water, opened her mouth wide, when some ten or twelve 

 young snakes ran or swam down her throat ; after which she 

 went in search of a hiding-place. She was, however, killed 

 and opened, and ' about twenty ' living young snakes were 

 found within her, ' two or three of which were seven or eight 

 inches long.' Out of the 120 cases recorded, sixty-seven of 

 the witnesses saw and described the actions so distinctly as 

 to leave no doubt in the minds of their hearers ; and of 

 these, twenty-two heard the parents' signal 'whistle,' or hiss, 

 or click, or rattles, according to the species observed. 



A man Charles Smith was ploughing near Chicago, when 

 his plough caught and turned over a large flat stone 

 (' rock,' as they call it there), exposing a very large rattle- 

 snake and her young ones. The mother rattled the alarm, 

 and all the young ones ran down her throat. Smith killed 

 the old one, and immediately the young ones began to crawl 

 back from her mouth and were killed by him. Thirteen of 

 them were five or six inches long. 



Some of the witnesses, after killing the snake into which 

 they had seen the young ones retire, saw them shaken out 

 a"-ain by dogs which had seized the mother. A few of the 

 observers went on several successive days to watch a certain 



