204 THE SNAKE. 



do get up into trees, then I take the liberty to re- 

 mark that he has told us nothing new. 



I have been in the midst of snakes for many years : 

 I have observed them on the ground, on trees, in 

 bushes, on bedsteads, and upon old mouldering 

 walls ; but never in my life have I seen a snake 

 pursue a retreating prey. I am fully satisfied, in 

 my own mind, that it is not in a snake's nature to 

 do so. A snake would follow its retreating prey in 

 a tree with just about as much success as a grey- 

 hound would follow a hare through the mazes of a 

 thick wood. Snakes are always in a quiescent state 

 just before they seize their prey; and their mode of 

 capturing it is by an instantaneous spring, consisting 

 of a bound which never exceeds two thirds of the 

 length of the reptile's body. 



As we are now on snakes, and as Mr. Taylor 

 informs us that the names of his birds and animals 

 " are corrected from the splendid work of Audubon," 

 I beg leave to draw his particular attention to plate 

 21. of that work. It represents a rattlesnake attack- 

 ing a mocking-bird's nest. Mr. Swainson, in his 

 critique upon it in the Magazine of Natural History, 

 i. 48, 49., seems lost in admiration at its excellence. 

 He says (after lauding plate 17.), " The same poetic 

 sentiment and masterly execution characterises this 

 picture." " Pictoribus atque poetis," &c. The 

 mouth of the rattlesnake is wide open, and the fangs 

 are the first things to attract the inspector's notice, 

 being by far the most conspicuous feature in it. 

 There they are on elephant [folio] with their points 

 curved upwards ! The artist, in his notes on the 



