ORDER OPHIDIA. 355 



its fatal venom has too well merited in every age of the 

 world. 



The berus is pretty generally extended in all the woody, 

 mountainous, and stony districts of temperate and southern 

 Europe. It is common on the borders of dry coppices, on 

 rocks and sands exposed to the sun, and is found throughout 

 the whole of France, the British islands, Germany, Sweden, 

 Poland, Russia, Italy, and even as far as Siberia and Norway. 

 But very recently it multiplied to an alarming extent in the 

 forest of Fontainbleau, where it was known under the name 

 of aspic. 



It lives on small quadrupeds, mice, field-mice, lizards, 

 frogs, toads, salamanders, young birds, and insects, such as 

 flies, ants, cantharides , and even scorpions, according to Aris- 

 totle. It also feeds on mollusca and worms, and, like all the 

 Ophidians, can support without any material suffering a fast 

 of many months. In many shops of pharmacopolists it is 

 said that vipers have been kept in casks for years without 

 giving them any thing to eat. 



Like the other serpents also, it casts its skin at determined 

 periods. It passes the winter and a part of the spring in a 

 state of lethargy, and often in society in places somewhat hu- 

 mid, and where the frost cannot penetrate. It is, in fact, 

 under heaps of stones, in the clefts of rocks, in excavated 

 roots, or in the trunks of rotten trees, that the vipers assem- 

 ble close to each other, during the rigorous months of winter, 

 and twist and interlace their bodies together as if to resist the 

 cold with greater facility. 



In the fine days of early spring, the vipers may be seen 

 basking in the morning sun, on little hills exposed to an east- 

 ern aspect, and they speedily occupy themselves in the great 

 work of propagating their species. The act of generation 

 takes a very long time in its accomplishment, and its result 

 is the vivification of from twelve to twenty-five eggs, almost 



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