312 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1951 



ejected with considerable accuracy to a distance of up to 8 feet. 

 Whether the aim is deliberate is not fully understood. Boulenger 

 makes the suggestion that the poison is mixed with the snake's normal 

 saliva and squirted through an opening in the membranes lining the 

 mouth which act as lips. If so, then this action would entitle this 

 cobra to its popular name. 



A snake's fang is a mechanical masterpiece and nature's parallel to 

 the hypodermic needle. Like the surgical instrument it is only used 

 when necessaiy, for most snakes strike only as' a means of defense or 

 to kill prey. Hair-raising stories of vicious serpents that pursue and 

 leap at their victims, in other words make a deliberate onslaught, are 

 usually figments of the imagination. Deliberate attack as opposed 

 to defense is a rare thing. 



The above remarks will make it appear that the life of the lowly 

 serpent is a matter for compensation, for "what it loses on the round- 

 abouts it gains on the swings." It cannot masticate its food, so it 

 swallows it whole; in this it can put a healthy human appetite to 

 shame, yet it can, if forced to, starve for over a year. Limbs as such 

 are missing, so it "walks" on its ribs, swims and grips with its tail, and 

 climbs on its scales. The outer skin does not grow, so from time to 

 time is peeled off neatly, even to the scales over the eyes. Taste is poor, 

 but this is compensated for by a strong sense of smell, in which the 

 harmless tongue assists by catching the smell particles from the air. 

 In hearing it is proverbially deaf, but may receive ample warning of 

 danger from vibrations through solid objects, which reach its sensitive 

 skin more swiftly than sound can travel through air. Prey it can 

 tackle and kill with a choice of two methods, poisoning or constriction, 

 or it can merely swallow it alive. 



The customs official, indeed many of us, may well puzzle over this 

 "limbless quadruped" of the herpetologist, but would no doubt agree 

 with all the fame and notoriety that it enjoys. It holds a position 

 unique among animals in being able to attract yet at the same time 

 repel the observer. Symbol of healing or of evil, feared in one place 

 and worshiped in another, it is steeped in legend and folklore. 



Enemy of man and persecuted unmercifully, the serpent may yet 

 hold its own in a hostile world for many years to come, owing its 

 survival to the unique machinery of its skeleton with which, as Sir 

 Richard Owen once said, "it can out-climb the monkey, out-swim the 

 fish, out-leap the jerboa, and out-wrestle the athlete." 



