896 MR. A. LOVERIDGE : NOTES ON 



I'iit, meanwhile, ran up to the window-sill and entered a blind hole ; 

 by the time I reached the room, the rat had jumped to the wash- 

 stand and was lying dead with blood flowing from its lel't hind 

 foot. As Pnfl' Adders are very common here and Cobras rare, 

 1 am fairly certain it was the foimer. This occuried about 3 p.m., 

 and 1 laid the rat by the hole, when, sure enough, it disappeared 

 at dusk, as I supposed it would. 



J ust before dark one evening I was pnssing the cases containing 

 snakes when I saw that a 2-foot Puff Adder had forced its head 

 through a. broken corner of the glass door. It could not get out 

 further as it was too fat, nor could it withdraw itself owing to 

 the triangular shape of the head. Taking hold of its neck Avith 

 forefinger and thumb, I eased the belly scales past the glass 

 Avith the left hand, then, shifting my grip to the head, was pressing 

 on the quadrate bones and was on the point of letting go when 

 the snake twisted round and drove its left fang down my thumb, 

 scoring it so that it at once began to bleed. I imagine no venom 

 was liberated, as I suffered no serious consequences, though all 

 precautions were immediately taken, my native helper lancing 

 and ligaturing my thumb, which was immersed in a solution of 

 permanganate so strong that it took all the skin off. I might 

 add that 1 put a rat into this Puff Adder's cage the following 

 morning ; the snalce bit it, and the rat died very promptly and 

 was duly swallowed. Whilst we were in camp at Lumbo a native 

 died in hospital from a Puff Adder's bite. 



A very large percentage of Puff Adders are infected with 

 nematode worms, which I Ijelieve at times are the cause of death, 

 thus: Kilosa, 28. vii. 21 — Young male adder found dead about 

 fifteen feet fiom the kitchen door. Its stomach and intestines 

 were very full of rat's fur ; in the ccsophagus Avere a large numlier 

 of immature ascarids which Dr. Baylis states are probably l^oly- 

 delphis quadr icon lis (Wedl.), 



Kilosa, 19. vii. 21 — One of my Puff Adders not having fed for 

 four months and being obviously unwell, I killed it. Beneath 

 the skin it had four nodules or flattish lumps of flesh-like substance 

 about I inch long, | inch wide, and ^ or | inch thick ; these united 

 the skin with the spine so that the reptile could not be skinned. 

 Another snake killed the same day had a large number of 

 minute nematodes in the OBSophagus which Dr. Baylis states are 

 Diaj^hanocephalus sp., and adds that the species is being described 

 from other material by Daubeney under the name of Z>. ohliqims. 



In another the viscera was teeming with F. quadricornis, and 

 there was also a tapeworm in the stomach. 



BiTis GABONicA Dum. & Bibr. 



Blgr, Cat. Snakes, iii. 1896, p. 499. 



My native collector shot a very fine specimen in the Usambara 

 Mtns. and preserved the skin. I examined a second specimen 

 from Kilwa, which is on the East Coast south of Dar es Salaam. 



