200 On thefafclnat'wg Faculty afcrihed to 



Before I proceed any further in my reply to Mr. Blu- 

 menbach, I beg leave to trouble you with feme fa£ts which 

 are a good deal liniilar to thofe related in my memoir. They 

 certainly favour the fvftem which I have advanced. Inde- 

 pendently, however, of their connexion with the fubjeft of 

 the memoir, thev appear worthy of prefervation ; for they 

 ferve to illuftrate, in Come degree, the hiftory of the nwnners 

 and inftinfts of ferpents; a fubjcft which has been too much 

 neglefted by naturalifts. 



A fpecies of coluber, which is commonly called the chicken 

 fnake in the fouthern parts of the United States, jj^ which it 

 is a native, frequently climbs up the lofiied trees inpurfuit 

 of young birds. One of my friends '', when he was in 

 Georgia, feveral years fince, had an opportunity of feeing 

 one of thefe fnakes in a fitualion which fu'-nifhes a Ikiking 

 argument in favour of my opinion. The aclive reptile having 

 feized upon a, young martin | (which had left its neft for fome 

 days), upon a walnut-tree, at the height of about thirty feet, 

 had not a little d'fficulty in fwallowing the young bird. Hav- 

 ina; taken in the head firft, as is commonly the cafe with our 

 ferpents, the bird made great refiftance by the flapping of its 

 wings, fo that the ferpent could only fwallow the head and 

 neck. Whilft the wings of the bird were in motion, num- 

 bers of the old martins collefting together flew nbout the 

 fnake and attacked him with their bills. Here, as in the 

 inftance related by Mr. Rittenhoufe, the old birds were ac- 

 tuated by the inftinft of faving their young. 



The following fa6ls were communicated to me by INIr. 

 John Heckewelder : — " In the -funnncr of 1770," fays this 

 gentleman, " while I was fithing under tjie bank of Le- 

 heigh I, I heard, for the fpace of near an hour, the found 

 of a ground-fquirrel, feemingly indifirefs, on the top of the 

 bank. At length I went up to fee what was the matter with 

 the fquirrel; when, to my utter aflonifhment, I difcovered 

 the animal about half way up a bulb, but running fometimes 

 higher up, fometimes lower down, and a very large rattle- 

 fnake at the root of the bufli on which the fquirrel was. 

 Here I was immediately ftruck with the idea that the fnake 

 was in the aft of inchanting, and I hoped now to become fully 

 convinced that the rattlefnoke obtained its prev altogether in 

 this manner, as I had often heard reported. I therefore fat 

 down quietly on a log about fix yards diliance, where I had 



• The ingenious Mr. William Bartrain. t Hirundo purpurea. 



X Ti-.i; pnticjp:il wMicri. branch of the Delaware, which lUiis by Beth- 

 hhsra. 



. . a full 



