344 CLASS REPTILIA. 



bury themselves in their retreat, from which they do not 

 emerge until after the vernal equinox. In winter then, of 

 course, they do not bite ; and in spring, and even to the 

 month of July, the effects of their bite amount almost to 

 nothing. 



Rattle-snakes are still to be found, from New York as 

 far as Savannah, and from the shores of the ocean to a very 

 advanced distance in the west and north-west. In 17975 

 Messrs. Palisot de Beauvois, and Peale, of Philadelphia, 

 took nine of them in two hours in New Jersey. 



At Cayenne, and in the hot latitudes of America gene- 

 rally, they are in constant activity all the year, and never 

 fall into a lethargic state. 



The crotali are viviparous ; at Martinique it is the general 

 persuasion that their offspring are eaten by the vipers when 

 they are very young, and a little after their birth. According 

 to M. Palisot de Beauvois, this prejudice derives its origin 

 from a fact wrongly interpreted. In the first journey made 

 by this naturalist, in the country of the native Tcharlokee, 

 he saw a crotdltis horridus in a path, and approached it as 

 Softly as possible. At the moment when it was about to be 

 struck, the animal agitated its rattles, opened a wide throat, 

 and received into it five little ones, about as thick each as a 

 goose-quill. But at the end of ten minutes, believing itself 

 out of danger, it opened its mouth again and let the young 

 ones out, which, however entered there again, on the appear- 

 ance of a new danger. Mr. Guillemart, a countryman of 

 our own, has verified the same fact. 



The negroes eat the flesh of the crotali as well as that of 

 other serpents. Their fat is collected and applied for the 

 purpose of mitigating the pains of sciatica ; and it is pretend- 

 ed that the delivery of women is facilitated by their bells or 

 rattles. 



These reptiles can live a very long time. Some have been 



