A DIFFICULT PROBLEM. 201 



statement that a Black Mamba will chase a person. (The 

 gentleman referred to was a prominent citizen of Pinctovvn, 

 Natal.) 



Mr. W. A. Lutman, of Durban, writes : " I have had con- 

 siderable experience with Mambas in my various shooting ex- 

 peditions, being bitten on one occasion by a Green Mamba, and 

 on several occasions I have killed Black Mambas under six feet 

 long. It is quite true that the Green Mamba when aged, turns 

 colour, but not anything like the colour of the Black Mamba. 

 The colour is something like steel blue, such as is seen on clock 

 springs, turning, as the snake gets older, to dark navy blue, but 

 only along the back, the sides retaining sufficient green to dis- 

 tinguish the snake. The natives assert that both the Black and 

 the Green Mamba, on attaining a certain age, develop a crest of 

 feathers on their heads. For this I cannot vouch. I have shot 

 both green and black ; the last Green Mamba that I shot 

 measured nine feet two inches, and was just turning steel-blue at 

 the back of its neck ; no sign of feathers. The last Black Mamba 

 I shot measured seven feet four inches, and was, I believe, laying, 

 or had already laid eggs, because it chased me, and it was only 

 by a lucky shot that I was prevented from being bitten." 



Mr. H. W. Bell-Marley, of Durban, who is a keen observer, 

 and who has had much experience of Mambas, says : " The first 

 signs of this snake losing his green coat is between eight and nine 

 feet, when, instead of his being brown, he is of a greenish-brown 

 colour, which soon changes as he ages to black. I think when he 

 is eleven feet in length he is what we might term an adult, or at 

 his largest dimensions." 



H. W. James, Esq., of Zwelle Estate, Verulam, Natal, says : 

 " I have lived for many years in this part of Natal, which is fully 

 supplied with Mambas. My parents have also resided here since 

 the early sixties. I can certainly state, both from hearsay and 

 also from my own experience, that Mambas of the green variety 

 grow to a large size, and I have myself shot one over nine feet in 

 length, and my parents killed one in the early days which, \\hen 

 measured, proved to be fifteen feet long. As regards Black 

 Mambas, a few years ago I found a newly-hatched lot of just one 

 dozen, and as lately as January of this year (1910), when cutting 

 cane, killed one nine feet long, and a few minutes later, within a 

 yard or two, killed a young one of about two feet long." 



