142 " ■ • , 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



No. I— A SNAKE AND A FISH. 



This morning, walking round the Lake, I saw a large water-snake 

 swimming towards the shore, and on neaier inspection I found he had in his 

 mouth quite a large fish which he held firmly by the extreme end of the tail 

 and which lay on its side apparently helpless underneath the suake. I do not 

 know what sort of fish it was, but it was about 8 inches long or a little more, 

 and about 3 inches deep, — very narrow, like a small sole or dab. It appeared 

 to be dead. The snake swam to the edge which consisted here .of a walk of 

 rough stones about 5 feet high, down which it was quite impossible to get, 

 and presently finding a hole proceeded to enter and pull the fish in. This at 

 first it ha<1 some difficulty in doing and on my throwing a stone down, the fish 

 showed renewed signs of lite and getting round into a vertical or natural 

 position, made a bit of a fight and pulled the snake's head and some eight or 

 nine inches of its body out of the hole. I dropped a stone right on to the top 

 of the snake, but the result was notwhst I expected, for it gave its body a jerk, 

 and getting the fish on to its side, again pulled it clean out of sight into the 

 hole. As I say, it was impossible to get down, so I cannot surmise how the 

 snake disposed of the fish, which would, of course, in time be drowned, in-fact 

 it seemed greatly advanced towards that condition when I saw it, due probably 

 to being towed along backwards through the water. Snakes are, we know, pretty 

 handy at swallowing, but the process of absorbing a fish tail foremost back 

 fins and all is rather a large order. I do not know whether my experience is 

 a common one, so send it on chance. 



H. D. OLIVIER, Col., R.E. 



Mount Abu, March, 1901. 



No. IT.— OCCUBRENCE OF THE LAGGAR FALCON IN BURMA. 



I am sending the skin of what I take to be the Laggar Falcon {F.jugger) 

 and shall be glad to know whether my identification is correct. In the Fauna 

 of British India (Birds, Yol. IIT,p. 420) it is mentioned as not haTing been 

 observed in Burma, but it may have been recorded since the publication of 

 that work. 



At any rate the bird in question is fairly common in this district, and 

 during the last two years I have found five nests — three of, which contained 

 eggs and the other two young birds. Two of the latter I kept for some months, 

 but both unfortunately died before attaining to the aciult st«ge of plumage. 



On the saine larg cotton tree, on which was the nest from which I took 

 the young birds on 23rd March, there were also some four or five nests of the 

 common Heron, some of which contained eggs. Two days previously I shot 

 a Falcon of the same species off her nest, from which I got thiee eggs of 

 much lighter colour and smaller than the others I have, and on this same 

 tree was the nest of a Black Ibis {Inocotis davisoni) containing a young bird 

 almost f ally fledged and one addled egg. The Herons and Ibises on both 



