A POPULAR TREA TJSE ON THE COMMON INDIAN SNAKES. lb 



Plains in Upper Assam and in Burma, but I would call it, an un- 

 common species at this level. In Burma Evans and I only got 4 

 specimens out of a total of considerably over 600 nearly all of which 

 were collected in the Plains. In Assam I got only 5 in the Plains 

 out of a total of 615 specimens. 



Habits. — Though a vertical pupil is usually associated with a 

 nocturnal habit, this snake appears to me to be more frequently 

 abroad in the day time than at night, in fact most of my specimens, 

 if not all, have been encountered during the day. It is a lively little 

 creature exhibiting much activity when disturbed, and I have usually 

 found it difficult to capture for two reasons, firstly owing to the 

 agility with which it disappears into cover which is always adjacent, 

 and secondly owing to the caution necessary in dealing with a snake 

 that cannot be distinguished from a viper with any degree of cer- 

 tainty till after capture. I have liberated specimens in the open, 

 on a road or in my verandah and it makes strenuous efforts to escape, 

 even indulging in a series of leaps in order to evade recapture. 



A hatchling of 4§ inches that I had in captivity managed to scale, 

 and cling to the face of the glass bottle in which it was incarcerated, 

 the diameter of its prison being about 4 inches, a truly marvellous 

 feat showing that its scan so rial powers are little if at all inferior to 

 that of the deftest climbing snakes, but in nature 1 have never 

 noticed any inclination for it to climb into bushes or trees. 



Disposition. — The mock viper is a plucky, and vicious snake. Those 

 I have met with have usually menaced if they have not actually struck 

 at me. One I had in captivity for some time invariably prepared to 

 strike at me, adopting a truly viperine pose with head erect and the 

 forebody retracted into sigmoid curves. Those I have flushed in their 

 native haunts have usually struck viciously at me, and more than 

 one trustworthy informant who has sent me a live specimen appears 

 to have met with a similar experience. Blanford* mentions encoun- 

 tering one in Sikkim that nearly bit him. Even the little hatchling 

 I had in captivity struck out fiercely at me. On the other hand 

 I have had two specimens that refused to strike under severe pro- 

 vocation, though they posed as if intending to do so. 



Food. — Its staple diet is of a reptilian order, frogs and lizards being 

 equally favoured. On four occasions I have found frogs in the 

 * Journal, Asiatic Society, Bengal, 1871, p. 373. 



