WHERE SNAKES LIVE 59 



looked back and saw it had not moved, and he 

 actually went back and touched it again ; when it 

 bit him, and in twenty minutes he was dead. It 

 was a huge cobra coiled up, slowly swallowing a 

 frog it had just caught. Mem. : Never kick a 

 black cat in the dark. 



Visitors sometimes, on being asked out to sit in 

 the garden, look round them suspiciously, and say 

 inquiringly, and with a threatening look, " No 

 cobras ! " as if they thought we kept them as pets, 

 and might be going to play tricks with them. I 

 have come to the conclusion that snakes also live 

 deep down among the roots of old trees, for that is 

 where we have seen many ; whenever a tree is cut 

 down and the roots dug up, snakes are found ; 

 mostly harmless ones ; either the little striped grass 

 snake or the large 7-foot rat snake. One very old 

 tree-stump disclosed a nest of tiny Eussells' vipers, 

 which are quite as dangerous as cobras. The rat 

 snakes do no harm, but the Burra Sahib gave out 

 an order. "Kill every snake you see ! " 



So it used to be no uncommon event to see 

 every man in the compound seizing sticks, spades, 

 rakes, whatever they could catch hold of, and flying 



