THE INDIAN BOA. 235 
sides. The ground colour is yellowish brown, lighter 
beneath. 
The extent of muscular power which these serpents 
possess in common with the Boas is truly wonderful. 
To the smaller among them the lesser quadrupeds and 
even birds fall‘an easy prey; but the larger, when ex- 
cited by the stimulus of hunger, are capable of crushing 
within their spiral folds the largest and most powerful of 
beasts. The sturdy buffalo and the agile stag become 
alike the victims of their fatal embrace; and the bulk 
of these animals presents but little obstacle to their 
being swallowed entire by the tremendous reptile, which 
crushes them as it were into a mass, lubricates them 
with the fetid mucus secreted in its stomach, and then 
slowly distending its jaws and cesophagus to an extent 
proportioned to the magnitude of the object to be 
devoured, and frequently exceeding by many times its 
own previous size, swallows it by one gradual and 
long-continued effort. 
Of the mode in which this operation is effected, a 
detailed description is contained in Macleod’s Voyage 
of His Majesty’s Ship Alceste ; and an excellent account 
has been subsequently given by Mr. Broderip in the 
second volume of the Zoological Journal from actual 
observation of the specimens now in the Tower. The 
vivid description of the latter almost brings before the 
reader’s eye the lightning dash of the serpent; the single 
scream of its instantly enfolded victim, whose heaving 
flanks proclaimed that it still breathed; and its last 
desperate effort, succeeded by the application of another 
and a deadly coil. With equal force and fidelity it 
sketches the continuation of the scene, when the serpent, 
after slowly disengaging his folds, placed his head oppo- 
