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STRANGE PETS. 



IT is unaccountable the taste some men have for 

 odd pets. I knew a man in the Railway at Coopum, 

 in the fifties, who had a rock-snake or boa for a 

 pet. He was an assistant on construction at the 

 time the Madras Railway was being built from 

 Jollarpett to Bangalore, and the snake was taken 

 in a large-sized mouse-trap with a falling door. The 

 snake was known to take shelter in a natural fis- 

 sure in the rocks that abound on the ghauts near 

 Coopum, and the trap was set near its entrance and 

 baited with a live fowl. The snake was found within 

 the trap next morning and the fowl had disappeared, 

 probably down the snake's throat. My friend trans- 

 ferred the snake to a rabbit hutch and there at- 

 tended to it himself until it got quite tame and 

 allowed him to handle it freely. He would take it 

 out and fold it round his neck like a comforter, or 

 stretch it out at arm's length, when it would wind 

 itself round his arm. Its length when caught was 

 nearly five feet, but it grew very quickly on the 

 diet of eggs and young chickens that it got twice 

 a week, and in six months' time, it was quite six 

 feet and weighed fifty pounds. After a time it was 

 allowed to roam the house at will when its master 



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