504 SNAKES. 



Nicholson will ' say nothing certain about the young going 

 down the throat, but sees no reason why not.' ' They can 

 do without air for half an hour or so, and a snake's throat is 

 sufficiently capacious to allow a frog to croak de profiindis 

 clamavi when he is two feet from daylight.' 



Among unprejudiced observers there are still some who 

 are inclined to attribute to optical delusion the sudden 

 disappearance of young snakes ; arguing from their astonish- 

 ing rapidity of motion, and the almost inappreciable space 

 into which they can creep and hide in theii; mother's coils. 

 Mr. Arthur Nicols, in his interesting papers on Snakes, 

 published in The Cojintry newspaper, in 1878-79, describes 

 a case of this kind from personal observation when in 

 Australia. He disturbed a snake with a number of young 

 around her, the latter quickly vanishing. He discharged his 

 gun, and the old snake was almost cut to pieces with shot. 

 Approaching, he found all the young ones hidden beneath 

 and about her, and when he stirred them up they persisted 

 in hiding among the shattered coils, returning thither to the 

 last. 



Mr. Nicols states only that it" was a poisonous snake, not 

 giving the specific name. She had probably incubated her 

 eggs, and the young had remembered the shelter of their 

 mother's coils. That it was a display of filial refuge is, 

 however, undeniable. 



A similar occurrence is related in the Field of November 

 lOth, 1866, by a Mr. Brittain, as an argument against the 

 swallowing process. He had seen young vipers run to their 

 mother for protection, and so completely out of sight that 

 only on disturbing them they were found to have secreted 



