COLUBER CONSTRICTOR. 59 
Sometimes the old bird by her cries calls in the assistance of her neighbours, to 
drive away the aggressor. I have seen more than a dozen birds, thus engaged 
with a large Black Snake, that had probably just committed some depredation, 
but was now quietly stretched on a rock, basking in the sun; and it was not a 
little singular that birds of very different genera, and those seldom seen together, 
all united in this warfare against a common enemy, and finally compelled him to 
seek shelter among some low, thick shrubs, by the violence of their assault. 
Another remark of Dr. Barton, on “fascination,” is worthy of attentive 
observation; he says, “as far as he could learn after many inquiries, that the 
season of the year at which any particular species of bird has been seen under 
the influence of the fascinating power of a serpent, corresponds with the exact 
time of their ‘incubation’ or rearing their young.” 
GrocraruicaL Disrrisution. The Coluber constrictor is found in nearly all 
parts of the United States, and may be regarded as the most common of our 
serpents. alm met with it as far north as latitude 43; thence it reaches to the 
shores of the Gulf of Mexico; nor is it confined to the Atlantic states, but abounds 
in the western country; Say found it even as high as Engineer Cantonment 
on the Missouri, and I have received specimens from Louisiana and Arkansas. 
Generat Remarks. Catesby first described the Black Snake, and accompanied 
his description with a very good figure. Kalm subsequently gave a long account 
of it in his travels, but he seems very credulous, and relates several absurd stories 
as to its habits. Linneus, by some great oversight, in the tenth edition of his 
Systema Nature, confounded this animal with the Heterodon simus; which error, 
however, he corrected in his twelfth and last edition. 
