WATCHING ADDERS 91 



denly draw back their heads, nor exsert their tongues, 

 nor make the least movement, but it was as if a 

 dry, light, dead leaf, or a ball of thistledown, had 

 floated down and settled near them, and they had 

 not heeded it. 



In the same way they probably saw me, and it 

 was as if they had seen me not, since they did not 

 heed my motionless figure ; but that they always 

 felt my presence after a time I felt convinced, for 

 not only when I stood close to and looked down 

 upon them, but also at a distance of four to eight 

 yards, after gazing fixedly at them for some minutes, 

 the change, the tremor, would appear, and in a little 

 while they would steal away. 



Enough has been said to show how much I liked 

 the company of these adders, even when I knew that 

 my presence disturbed their placid lives in some in- 

 definable way. They were indeed more to me than all 

 the other adders, numbering about a score, which I 

 had found at their favourite basking places in the 

 neighbourhood. For they were often to be found in 

 that fragrant, sequestered spot where their home was ; 

 and they were two together, of different types, both 

 beautiful, and by observing them day by day I in- 

 creased my knowledge of their kind. We do not 

 know very much about " the life and conversation " of 

 adders, having been too much occupied in " bruising " 

 their shining beautiful bodies beneath our ironshod 

 heels, and with sticks and stones, to attend to such 



