Parasites, Diseases and Enemies'* 273 



ing the ponds in summer there would be many of these 

 snakes seen to dodge into the water and hide under 

 the overhanging grass. It was fun to see lady visitors 

 screech when I threw off my coat and plunged the left 

 arm under the bank, bringing out the angry beast, 

 which, if not taken too near the neck, vented its wrath 

 in sinking its teeth into my hand. But it was only like 

 a brier scratch; not half as severe afterward as the 

 prick from the spine of a catfish, but when my good 

 right hand took the reptile by the head and twisted it 

 from its body, some people thought it cruel. To me it 

 was "cruel" to see a snake take a trout, especially one 

 that I had raised. Yet that snake filled its place in 

 nature ; the main trouble is that man writes up all these 

 things from his point of view, just as I am doing. 



The other non-poisonous water snake which I know, 

 although others are recorded, is the Southern one (T. 

 fasciatus), which has dark vertical bands on its sides, 

 and has a reddish-brown belly. This snake is seldom 

 found north of Georgia. I knew it quite well, having 

 looked it over for poison fangs and found it to be harm- 

 less, so when a lady from Ponchitoula landed one and 

 was about to spring out of the boat, I called to her 

 to swing it over to me. She did so, and I was tempted 

 to bite the animal's head off, just for bravado, but 

 merely unhooked it and killed it with my heel. 



The Northern sportsmen should remember this: 

 Our North American poisonous serpents have trian- 

 gular heads and also have a deep pit between the eye 

 and the nostril, like a second nostril. The snake known 

 as a copperhead in the North and cottonmouth in the 

 _South (Ancistrodon contortrix) has the top of its head a 

 coppery-red, and a lot of V-shaped blotches on its back. 

 If I am not mistaken, it is called "pilot" and "rattle- 



