MR. BUCK LAND ON ENGLISH SNAKES. 



could. Has the common English 

 snake, while in a state of nature, 

 never been seen with her young? 

 Or has no one had one which had a 

 progeny when in captivity, to know 

 how the young are hatched, and 

 whether the mother shows no con- 

 cern in regard to them ? It is possi- 

 ble that evidence on these points 

 cannot be found in either of these 

 ways, but it would not on that ac- 

 count follow that the mother's 

 labour was only to lay the eggs and 

 cover them up. Mr. B. says she 

 deposits the eggs in " a dunghill or 

 heap of decaying vegetable matter," 

 without saying how far from the sur- 

 face, and how covered up. This 

 snake, I presume, is not, and can- 

 not be, either a digger or scraper, 

 like the turtle when she deposits her 

 eggs in the sand, or when she hy- 

 bernates ; which peculiarity is also 

 shown by the young as they leave 

 the eggs. How, then, do the young 

 snakes emerge from the stuff that 

 surrounds, and, doubtless, covers 

 them? According to the Encyclo- 

 paedia Britannica, crocodiles " are 

 oviparous, and bury their eggs in the 

 sand, and the female remains in the 

 vicinity to dig them up on the day 

 that the young ones break the 

 shell;" and of the St. Domingo 

 crocodile it says : " At the time of 

 the escape of the young, the female 

 comes to scrape away the earth and 

 let them out. She conducts, de- 

 fends, and feeds them by disgorg- 

 ing her own food for about three 

 months." And, according to Audu- 

 bon, the female alligator watches 

 near the spot where her eggs are 

 deposited, covered with rubbish and 

 mud, and leads the young to the 

 lake. In the propagation of fish 

 we can easily understand why the 

 mother leaves the eggs to their fate ; 

 and the same may be said in regard 

 to some insects and the frog family, 

 on account of the various stages of 

 development through which they 

 pass, and also for the reason of the 

 immense number of eggs laid, which 



would prevent the mother taking 

 care of them all. But the English 

 snake, large as her progeny some- 

 times is, is doubtless perfectly able 

 to act the part of a mother to them, 

 like the adder and the American 

 snakes, which take care of their 

 young, even receiving them inside 

 of them. Besides, the English 

 snake, like them, deposits her eggs 

 in her habitat, and is never far from 

 them ; and the natural conclusion 

 would be, that she visits her nest 

 and removes, or helps to remove, 

 the matter surrounding the eggs, and 

 takes the young under her care 

 for a time, however short. Does 

 anyone know, for certainty, that she 

 does not do so ? 



What Mr. Buckland says of the 

 English snake applies well to those 

 in America. " The shell of the egg 

 is of a beautiful white colour, like a 

 common hen's egg, and feels like a 

 very soft white kid-glove. If we 

 cut open these eggs just before they 

 are hatched, the young snakes will 

 come out quite lively and attempt 

 to escape. I tried this experiment 

 last summer." It is very unlikely 

 that American snakes should take 

 the great care they do of their 

 young, while the English one does 

 nothing further than lay the eggs. 

 The American snakes are doubtless 

 " in at the birth," and assist on the 

 occasion, for how else could they 

 mother the progeny ? Would they 

 likely do that with any covey of 

 young snakes that might come in 

 their way ? I gave, on a former oc- 

 casion, an instance of a man on 

 Long Island killing an old snake 

 (doubtless the mother) which kept 

 hovering about a nest of eggs at the 

 point of hatching, which he found 

 in a fence when repairing it. 



Mr. Buckland also says : " I 

 have been credibly informed that a 

 gentleman, fond of natural history, 

 while taking a ramble on the coast 

 of Essex, killed a viper full of eggs. 

 He took out his penknife and let 

 out a string of eggs fourteen in 



