70 THE SNAKES OF SOUTH AFRICA. 



Python's Eggs. 



In the wild state, when the female Python desires to lay her 

 eggs, she selects some secluded spot amongst tangled brushwood 

 down an Aard-vark hole, or in one of the innermost crevices of a 

 rugged krantz. She lays her eggs in a heap, coils her body 







I'lc. 33. — A South African Python about to swallow a Klip Dassie (Procavia capensis), 

 which it has captured and constricted. 



around them, fold above fold, with her head on top, completely 

 concealing the eggs. During the incubation period, the snake's 

 temperature rises to about 96° Fahr., which seems to be a pro- 

 vision of Nature for the hatching of the eggs. I am by no means 

 sure whether the eggs would not hatch just as well, if laid in 

 some warm, moist place, and left to incubate by themselves, as 

 is the case with most other egg-laying snakes. One reason which 



