A STRANGE SHELTER. 305 



wealthy Port Elizabeth, merchant, owns quite a 

 gallery of them. They are very clever but rather 

 crude, but this is scarcely to be wondered at when 

 we consider the protracted, wild, dangerous, and 

 exposed life he led. 



The hoop-snake I have also heard of in Southern 

 India and the Malay Archipelago, both countries 

 which in former days were subject to the influences 

 of the Dutch East India Company. In Batavia, a 

 guest of my host an up-country planter spoke so 

 familiarly of this reptile, that I thought of course 

 he had seen it, but he had not, although numbers 

 of his friends and servants had. Perhaps " Bara- 

 long's " letter will bring forth a man who has been 

 witness of a hoop-snake in full pursuit, for since the 

 sea-serpent has ceased to give a periodical exhibi- 

 tion, something snaky is wanted to stir us all up. 



The puff-adder of South Africa is not only a very 

 deadly serpent, but a very repulsive one. I do not 

 think that it is generally known that it does not 

 strike forwards, but sideways, or nearly back- 

 wards. Among the settlers, traders, and natives, 

 a belief is dominant that the female of this race 

 only produces one family, for the reason that the 

 young release themselves from captivity by eating 

 their way into the world through their mother's 

 stomach. Several white and black men have 

 asserted that they have witnessed this occurrence, 

 having been called to where it was taking place by 

 the lamentable and heart-rending cries of the un- 

 happy parent (?). I should not like to doubt the 

 veracity of old friends, but until I see the epi- 

 sode take place, I fear that I shall remain sceptical, 

 for the reason that I am convinced that when the 

 young of the puff-adder are in a very early stage, 

 after they have become acquainted with an indepen- 

 dent existence from their producer, they will, if 

 alarmed, seek security in the parent's inside. 



X 



