282 THE VIVARIUM. 
powers were shown the smal] reptile, less, perhaps, than 2ft. 
long, and not thicker in any part of its body than a man’s little 
finger, and an egg of a common barn-door fowl, and then told that 
the snake could swallow the egg without losing any of its contents 
or even breaking the shell, they would be justified in doubting either 
the veracity or intelligence of the speaker and exhibitor. The 
Snake, however, owing to the marvellous distensibility of both its 
mouth and cesophagus (the canal through which the food passes 
to the stomach), is able to perform the apparently impossible feat 
of swallowing the egg. 
D. scabra has such small and so few teeth in its jaws, that it 
once received the generic name of anodon (toothless). Yet this 
want of tooth-power ministers to the animal’s well-being. For 
were the teeth long and strong the egg would run the risk of 
being cracked or pierced before it could pass into the Snake’s 
gullet, and some of its contents would be lost. The teeth of the 
jaws, however, are just large enough to hold the egg firmly during 
the first stages of deglutition. | When the egg has passed into the 
gullet, the mouth of the reptile is closed, and by the contraction 
of the muscles of the gullet the egg is pressed against those enamel- 
capped processes, already referred to, until the shell is cut and 
broken, and its contents are passed on to the stomach, while the 
crushed and folded shell is disgorged as a pellet. The egg is held 
stationary, while being thus pierced and crushed, at a distance of 
about 2in. from the angle of the mouth. Dy. Andrew Smith, in 
1829, was one of the first, if not the first, to notice the capabilities 
and habits of this curious and interesting Snake. Other Snakes 
which swallow eggs whole do not eject the shell, but digest it. 
D. scabra belongs to the sub-family Rhachiodontine (the Spine- 
toothed). This sub-family contains the single genus Dasypeltis, 
ot which genus, I believe, D. scabra is the only species. This 
Snake has a small head, hardly distinct from the neck; a small 
eye, having a vertical pupil ; a sncut which is rounded, short, 
and convex ; a rostral which is broader than deep, and scarcely 
visible from above ; generally a groove running down the middle 
of the vertical shield ; as a rule, one pree-ocular, two post-oculars, 
no loreal, generally seven upper labials, and a pair of large chin- 
shields, which are followed by two smaller ones. The scales of the 
