IIFAIPETOLOGY. 309 



Dr. Mason writes : "Mr. Theoli^ild is prohalily right wlu-n lie says, ' This snake is 

 I believe of inott'ensivc liabits unless irritated ' ; ' but then it must be let alono, and 

 no mistake, for the mistake may be fatal. On two or threi; occasions I have found it 

 fijjlit manfully when attacked; but it sometimes runs, and it has been known when 

 pursued to clear a high ])ile of stones that obstructed its path. In May, 1871, I heard 

 a disturbance among a litter of kittens in my dressing room, and on looking in, there 

 was a cobra reared up in the form of a caj^ital S, with its peculiar undulatory motions, 

 at a young kitten, whose back was raised like a hedgehog's, and every hair seemed to 

 stand out straight like the quills of the fretful porcupine, while it growled loudly at 

 the snake and held its ground manfully. I was anxious to see tlio result of the fight, 

 but after the sparring had continued at least two minutes, I incautiously approached 

 •so near the combatants that thc^ cobra took the alarm, and ran under a box, leaving 

 the kitten in possession of tlie field. With a view to bringing him out iu front that 

 I might get a blow at him, I threw a kitten in behind the box ; but contrary to my 

 expectation, he came out behind, and although I hit him, escaped down a hole in the 

 floor. The kitten that I had thrown into his hiding-place walked feebly across the 

 floor, staggered like one blind and laid quietly down and died without uttering a cry. 

 The snake had .struck it above the left eye, where there was a little swelling. In the 

 evening 1 heard another disturbance among the kittens, and went into the room in the 

 dark, not antici])ating the return of the snake, when matters quieted down again. An 

 hour afterwards another kitten was found dead. "With such dangerous neighbours 

 which we all have in the country, it is worthy of inquiry what is it that attracts 

 them into our houses. A little Burman boy said that it was the kittens, and that he 

 liad two kittens devoured by snakes. There were two baskets of green mangoes in 

 the room near to the kitten's nest, and our Tamil servant said that it was the mangoes 

 which drew in the snake, and he fortified his opinion by quoting two deaths from 

 cobra bites that had come to his knowledge among the Burmans, where the sufferers 

 had thrust their bauds into baskets of mangoes, and were bitten by cobras that had 

 liiikleu themselves in the bottom of the baskets, and that within a few days the 

 servants had turned up a cobra in a pile of mangoes in the mess house." The Burman 

 boy may have been right, as a cobra could swallow a kitten as easily as a rat, or the 

 snake miglit have entered the house in search of a dry spot, if the country outside 

 was inundated. The wily Tamulian probably had his own reasons for wishing 

 ' master ' to keep his mangoes anywhere rather than in his own room. Dr. Mason 

 adds: " Tlio natives say the cobras make their homes in holes in the ground, but 

 come into houses in search of food. In the forests they build nests of grass among 

 rocks or under logs, and the snake charmers often take the eggs and raise from them 

 docile snakes." This last observation is wholly incredible, no snake charmer that 

 I ever saw being possessed of young cobras. 



K". ELAPS, Sehl. 



The Hamadiyad. 



Scales smootli, in 15 rows. Snbcaudals bifid, except the anterior ones, which are 

 single. Colour brown, with paler cross-bands edged with black. Throat yellow. Or 

 some .specimens greenish olive, with numerous oblique black and white bands converging 

 towards the head. Belly mottled or blackish, with yellow throat. The young are 

 black, with narrow equidistant white bauds and head white-banded. Grows to 170 

 inches. 



Inhabits India, Burma and Tenasserim. 



Dr. Mason writes : "The Hamadryad is the most formidable reptile in the coimtiy. 

 It may be described in general terms as a magnificent variety of the cobra. It has 



• The entire passage runs thus. "This snake is I believe of inoffensive habits unless irritated, but 

 is of course a dangerous neiglibour to liave in a house. Not only iu Burma, where the respect for lilo 

 is greatest, but in India also I liavc known a cobra, enticed or forced into an earthen jar and then 

 carried by two men across a river, or some distance from the village, and tlien liberated. The profes- 

 sional snake charmers, I believe, in liurma liberate tlieir snakes after a few weeks' captivity, to prevent, 

 I suppose, their dying of starvation in their liands, and in deference to that tenderness for animal life, 

 wliicb is so clianning a trait of Buddhism." Liuuean Society's Journal, vol. x. 



