SNAKES 97 



MAY 



SNAKES 



ON this beautiful May morning I go out with 

 entire confidence to look for grass snakes. 

 There is the very big one that hung out all last 

 summer next to the water hole in the Upper 

 Orchard. He was a wily old fellow who never 

 gave you a chance to catch him, but I think I could 

 catch him this morning, overcome with the delight 

 of a sun bath so early in the year. Then there is 

 the under side of the hedge by the Roman road 

 where I have often found half a dozen at a time 

 coiled and ecstatically flung among the primroses. 

 They hibernate somewhere near and congregate 

 there thickly for a week or two before each going 

 off to its own summer domain. 



The greatest spring congregation ever seen was 

 in a field higher up the hill. There on a bank in 

 full view of the public footpath a bush round a 

 hawthorn stump yielded one year an amazing 

 tangle of snakes. They were seen by a party of 

 women coming down the hill, and they declared 



