56 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



Providence has been so indulgent to us as to allow of but one 

 venomous reptile of the serpent 

 kind in these kingdoms, and that 

 is the viper. As you propose the 

 good of mankind to be an object 

 of your publications, you will not 

 omit to mention common salad-oil 

 as a sovereign remedy against the 

 bite of the viper. As to the blind Vi P er - 



worm (anguis fragilis, so called because it snaps in sunder with 

 a small blow), I have found, on examination, that it is perfectly 

 innocuous. A neighbouring yeoman (to whom I am indebted 

 for some good hints) killed and opened a female viper about the 

 twenty-seventh of May: he found her filled with a chain of 

 eleven eggs, about the size of those of a blackbird ; but none of 

 them were advanced so far towards a state of maturity as to con- 

 tain any rudiments of young. Though they are oviparous, yet 

 they are viviparous also, hatching their young within their bellies, 

 and then bringing them forth. Whereas snakes lay chains of 

 eggs every summer in my melon beds, in spite of all that my 

 people can do to prevent them ; which eggs do not hatch till the 

 spring following, as I have often experienced.* Several intelli- 

 gent folks assure me that they have seen the viper open her 



orange in the spring, everywhere marked with large round spots of black, of unequal sizes. 

 The female is considerably less spotted, and of a duller hue, the spots being everywhere very 

 much smaller, and sometimes quite wanting on the under parts. " When on land," as is accu- 

 rately remarked by Mr. Jenyns, " the skin loses its softness, becoming at the same time opaque 

 and somewhat corrugated ; the various membranes disappear; the toes, from being rounded, be- 

 come flattened ; and the colours are everywhere more obscure. In this state it is the lacerta vul- 

 o-aris of Sheppard and Turton (and probably of Linnaeus also), the triton vulgaris of Fleming, 

 the brown lizard of Pennant, and the common newt of Shaw." Very small specimens have occa- 

 sionally been met with upon land, which have given rise to the erroneous supposition that the 

 land ones are a distinct species, and probably viviparous. To account for these, Mr. Jenyns has 

 suggested that, in cases where their haunts have been dried up, the young animal may very pos- 

 sibly absorb its gills prematurely, in order that it might be enabled to accommodate itself to its 

 new circumstances. 



The streaked newt (T. vittatus) is allied to the preceding species, and was first detected by Mr. 

 Gray, in ponds near London. The skin is smooth, of a pale colour, with unequal black spots, 

 which are smaller than in the T. punctatus ; tail of a darker hue than the back ; under parts, to- 

 gether with a broad streak along each side of the body and tail, whitish. Some (probably the 

 females) are described to be " above black, beneath white, throat black-spotted, dorsal crest 

 none." It is rather larger than the T. pinctahis; the male has a high, deeply-notched dorsal 

 crest, commencing in front of the eyes, and with a deep notch over the vent, continued into a 

 comparatively very low entire crest, extending the whole length of the tail. Some have the caudal 

 crest distinct. ED 



* The young, however, appear almost ready for exclusion before the winter. Mr. White's 

 term " chains of eggs" is by no means a felicitous expression, to .judge from all that I have ever 

 seen ; they are of the size of those of a garden merle (or blackbird), and covered with a tough 

 elastic skin, which, at the time of deposition, is lubricated with a wet mucus, that on drying 



