PREFACE. 



An explanation and even an apology would seem to be required for this 

 little book. The latter especially, since I have not any very extensive or 

 scientific knowledge of snakes and nearly all my information has been derived 

 from other books. I have made no new discoveries ; all that is original is the 

 arrangement of the facts. 



So much for the apology. The explanation and justification lie in the 

 fact, that I think most people, when a snake is killed, like to be able to tell 

 what sort it is ; or at any rate whether it is poisonous or not. 



I had this desire so strongly when I first came to India that I bought Dr. 

 Nicholson's book on " Indian Snakes, " and later on welcomed the publication 

 of Major Wall's book on " Poisonous Indian Snakes." 



From these books I have found it possible to identify all the snakes I have 

 come across. But Wall's book deals only with poisonous snakes and Nicholson 

 is so comprehensive that it takes a lot of time and hard work for the ordinary 

 man to find what he wants. 



I gradually simplified matters for myself by making notes, classifying, 

 separating rare snakes and " solitary museum specimens " from the common 

 ones, and so on, until the present little work is the result. 



In it 1 have endeavoured to use only simple language and English names 

 as far as possible ; and I have dealt only with the commoner snakes found in 

 India and Burma, snakes such as the ordinary dweller in cantonments or 

 district officer is likely to come across. There are numerous others, but so far 

 I have only come across one that is not mentioned in this book, so I infer that 

 the rarer snakes are not often met and need not trouble the ordinary person, 

 who should be able to identify easily any snake he comes across and, even 

 more easily, to tell a poisonous from a non-poisonous one by means of this 

 book. 



The scientific names are taken from Mr. Boulenger's Catalogue of 

 British Museum Snakes : the English names are from Dr. Nicholson's book 

 •r are names in Major Wall's writings. 



It is curious, by the way, that although the term " Grass Snake " is 

 frequently heard, I have been unable to find out to what particular snake 

 (if any) it refers. 



I have always found that coloured pictures of snakes were practically 

 useless in identifying specimens, so I do not regret their absence in this little 

 book. 



