1 88 



APPENDIX. 



impeached by any one. Part of it 

 consisted of a paper read by Pro- 

 fessor G. Brown Goode, of the Uni- 

 versity of Middletown, Connecticut, 

 before the Science Convention at 

 Portland, in the State of Maine, in 

 1873, which furnished evidence from 

 nearly a hundred people from many 

 parts of the United States; several 

 gentlemen present testifying of their 

 own knowledge to the fact of snakes 

 swallowing their young, particularly 

 Professor Sydney J. Smith, of the 

 Sheffield Scientific School, Yale 

 College, who "added to the testi- 

 mony of the paper his personal evi- 

 dence, that he had seen ' with his 

 own eyes ' young snakes entering 

 and issuing from the mouth of an 

 older one." 



Mr. Buckland brings forward no 

 evidence whatever in support of 

 himself and his friends as "anti- 

 swallowers." What he says amounts 

 virtually to this, that what he and 

 they do not know, or do not under- 

 stand, has no existence in fact! 

 The twelve verses of the song, to 

 the tune of Lord Lovel, composed 

 by Mr. Henry Lee, in connection 

 with himself and Mr. Higford Burr, 

 in attempted derision of " swallow- 

 ers," has no bearing on the ques- 

 tion at issue. He, indeed, advances 

 Mr. Davy, the bird-catcher and 

 dealer, who and whose employes 

 never saw a viper swallow her 

 young, and therefore pronounce the 

 idea a " story of Old Mother Hub- 

 bard ! " He also quotes Mr. Hol- 

 land, the keeper of the snakes at 

 the Zoological Gardens, who never 

 saw it done in his collection of 

 snakes; from which Mr. Buckland 

 infers that the idea is a romance. I 

 attach no weight to what Mr. Davy 

 says ; but Mr. Holland is entitled 

 to a particular notice. I would ask 

 him if he knows for certainty how 

 vipers are born. If he finds that 

 the mother passes the young in the 

 shape of an egg or ball, about the 

 size of a blackbird's egg, when they 

 immediately disengage themselves 



from the covering after it has 

 touched the ground, how can he 

 find a viper full of young, upwards 

 of seven inches long, arid so active 

 as to instantly fight or run, unless 

 they afterwards entered her by the 

 mouth ? Like Mr. Davy, the bird- 

 man, he will doubtless scratch his 

 head and cry, " Old Mother Hub- 

 bard ! " Most likely both gentle- 

 men's knowledge is limited to their 

 own observations, and, like such 

 people generally, they are poor 

 judges of what has been observed 

 by others under different circum- 

 stances. Thus Mr. Holland con- 

 cludes that vipers do not, and there- 

 fore cannot, swallow their young 

 while in a state of nature, because 

 they do not do it while in captivity 

 a most illogical conclusion. His 

 vipers have either been born in 

 captivity, or become reconciled to 

 it through time, so that their house, 

 cage, or den is the only place of 

 safety they know of. And for what 

 purpose would a viper swallow her 

 young under these circumstances? 

 It could not be to carry them any- 

 where, or shield them from the 

 weather, or protect them against 

 danger that was avoidable ; the last 

 being the reason always given by 

 people who have seen the phenome- 

 non. This I explained in Land 

 and Water, when I also met the 

 objection of the viper-catchers. 



It would be interesting to be told 

 by Mr. Buckland how viviparous 

 snakes are actually born. He cuts 

 open a viper, and finds inside a 

 string or necklace of eggs about an 

 inch in length. Further on in the 

 season he cuts open another viper, 

 and finds the same number (as it 

 may be) of young, upwards of seven 

 inches long, complete and active 

 snakes, lying all sorts of ways, with 

 no remains of the eggs. He says 

 that these have not yet been born ; 

 whereas, in fact, they had previously 

 been born in the way described, 

 and had returned to the same cham- 

 ber by the mouth. An assumption 



