62 THE SNAKES’ OF SOUTH AFRICA. 
cave at the foot of akrantz. After killing it, we dragged its body 
out into the light, and discovered that a pair of Duiker Buck 
horns were sticking fully an inch and a half through its ribs and 
skin. It had evidently swallowed the buck, horns and all, and 
the latter worked their way through the skin. The Python 
would probably not have died through the injury. These reptiles 
have such powerful digestive juices that the whole body, bones 
and all, of the buck, would have been digested, and the horns 
would eventually have dropped out. Ona second occasion I was 
present when a Python was killed, with the horns of a Duiker 
Ram sticking out of its skin. In this case the skull had evidently 
been dissolved by the snake’s gastric juices, for the horns came 
away very easily when pulled, leaving two small round holes in 
the snake’s side, which doubtless would have healed in a very 
short time. 
One day when lying under the shade of a big forest tree near 
Table Mountain, in Natal, I heard the terrified cries of an animal. 
On emerging from the bush, I saw a Python with a Duiker Buck 
in its deadly folds. Having no gun, I converted the branch of a 
tree into a cudgel, and rushed up the incline at the snake. How- 
ever, on seeing me approaching, it quickly disengaged its jaws, 
unwound its coils, and made off amongst the bush-covered rocks, 
leaving the buck in a dying state upon the ground. 
On another occasion my Fox Terriers gave tongue. Climbing 
over rocks and stubbly bush in the direction of the sound, Isawa 
Python of average size with head and neck distended enormously. 
On seeing me it made desperate efforts to disgorge, but its jaws 
were so dreadfully stretched that it was seemingly powerless to 
reverse its mechanism. I rapidly tied one end of a stout cord 
round the snake’s middle, and the other end to a tree, and ran 
back to get a strong linen bag from a satchel, which hung from my 
saddle. Returning, I found the Python had succeeded in dis- 
gorging its prey, which was a half-grown Duiker. The reptile 
was worked up into a great state of excitement by the badgering 
of the terriers, and his inability to escape. Holding out the 
spread-out bag, the Python lunged forward and seized it. The 
snake’s recurved teeth got entangled in the material, and without 
a moment’s delay I enveloped its head, and then seized it by 
the neck. Wrapping the bag round its head, I tied it with a cord. 
I sat down and waited patiently until the Python had expended 
