TRE COMMON INDIAN SNAKES. 213 



Habits. — I became familiar with the Eoyal Snake in Ohitral. 

 Here the country is very stony, and in clearing the ground for 

 cultivation it is difficult to dispose of the stones. Many are utilised to 

 build walls, which loosely put together encompass every khet. The 

 surplus are thrown into heaps. These walls and heaps furnish 

 attractive quarters for many snakes, but to this species, and the cobra 

 specially. Being loose in their construction there are spacious 

 crevices, and galleries running through them in every direction. 

 The Royal Snake frequently hibernates among these stones, which 

 even in the winter absorb sufficient heat from the sun to offer cosy 

 accommodation. As the year advances, and the sun gets hotter, it 

 is tempted to emerge for a sun bath, and on the least approach 

 of danger precipitately disappears into its stony fastness. It is 

 obviously on this account much more frequently seen than captured. 

 In April 1899 when the Fort at Chakdara was being reconstructed, 

 no fewer than four adult specimens of this snake and two cobras 

 were dislodged while dismantling a few j^ards of an old masonry 

 wall. One of these had recently fed on a rat, and it seems probable 

 that even in winter retirement a chance meal can sometimes be 

 secared. More than one specimen was killed in the crowded fort at 

 Malakand, and I have known others invade habitations presumably 

 in search of food. 



Food. — I have on two occasions known rats eaten, and on one a 

 mouse. Mr. Colan writing from Jodhpore (Rajputana) found one 

 up in a tree shikaring a squirrel. 



Breeding. — Though I have seen a large series of freshly killed as 

 well as Museum specimens it is singular that I have never had one 

 gravid female. I can find no mention of one in the literature of this 

 snake. I feel pretty confident that the eggs (presuming that the species 

 is oviparous) are deposited in the hot months, May, June and July, 

 a season when I was at 10,000 ft. in the Hills. The few specimens 

 sent to me during this period were either cJ c? , immattire 5 § 

 or specimens too putrified to examine. The length of the hatchling 

 is not known. The smallest specimens I have had were 1 foot 6^ 

 inches and 1 foot 7^ inches in October or November, 1 foot 8| inches 

 in February, and 1 foot 4f inches in March. It appears to grow 

 about a foot between the 2nd and 3rd, and 3rd and 4th years of 

 life, and a similar rate of growth in the first year seems to indicate 

 that the hatchling is about fourteen to sixteen inches long. The 

 sexes are very evenly balanced judging from m}'' Chitral records 

 Of 24 sexed, 12 proved to be S 6 , ai^d. 125$. The s claspers 

 are beset with pedunculated cartilaginous processes. The anal 

 glands secrete a material like custard in consistency and colour. 



Parasites. — I found many specimens infested with small, oval- 

 shaped, white, parasites which were very numerous in the 

 peritoneum around the coils of the intestine. These were submit- 



