266 The Field Naturalisfs Quarterly Nov. 



hasty estimate at an exciting moment. Similarly, when 

 two persons give diametrically opposed descriptions of the 

 process, one saying that the young jumped into the mother's 

 mouth, which was raised off the ground, the other that she 

 put her mouth flat on the ground and the young wriggled 

 in, one can only conclude that one or both were mistaken. 

 The fact is that persons who are not trained to observing 

 cannot describe the simplest processes with accuracy, and 

 therefore their descriptions are worthless. It does not 

 follow that what they attempt to describe never occurs, 

 but it does follow that their accounts cannot be accepted. 

 And when one finds persons who have some knowledge of 

 comparative anatomy recording the finding of young adders 

 5 inches long in an ovary, we may well excuse the 

 uneducated for similar loose statements. In both cases the 

 event described may have occurred, but in neither case can 

 the description be accepted as accurate. 



The only scientific attitude to take up on questions of 

 this sort which are unproved is to await events, and to 

 carefully weigh such evidence as is forthcoming, whether 

 that evidence is negative or affirmative. Dogmatic asser- 

 tions, sweeping statements, or abuse of those who happen 

 to differ from one, do not tend to advance knowledge. 



VI. The Capacity of the Adder's Gullet. 



For some years past I have been hoping to obtain a 

 specimen which would lend itself to illustration in such 

 a way as to convey some adequate conception of the 

 enormous capacity of the gullet in the adder. Up to the 

 present season I had been unable to get exactly what I 

 wanted, or if I did get a good specimen for this purpose, 

 it was when I found myself in some lonely spot with no 

 means of quickly preserving it in situ. I have frequently 

 taken adders which were in process of feeding or had 

 recently fed, and several photographs of adders thus en- 

 gaged appear in 'British Serpents' (pp. 91, 89). But none 

 of these show the capacity of the gullet, though they do 

 illustrate the enormous power of distension possessed by 

 the jaws. In the ' Zoologist ' (September 1900) I published 



