SNAKES OF CEYLON. 439 



they have been found on the ground, or floors, far less com- 

 monly in roofs, or situations necessitating clambering efforts 

 It appears to be decidedly nocturnal in habit, most of my 

 specimens having been killed at night. Mr. Millard men- 

 tions in a letter to me that in captivity it likes to get away 

 from the light, and Colonel Dawson informs me that " in 

 captivity they never move, as a rule, during the day time, 

 but become very active about dusk." 



(b) Disposition : The krait is one of the most inoffensive 

 snakes I know. I have had numerous living examples 

 brought to me, and have kept several in captivity, so that my 

 opportunities for studying its nature have been abundant. 

 Time after time I have recorded the singular timidity of 

 this snake in my notebooks, often under the greatest provo- 

 cation, and only once have I seen one bite at anything of 

 anger. This specimen had been impaled through and through 

 by a trident, and could only move a few inches of its body 

 behind the head. It must have been enduring the most 

 fearful torture, but even in this predicament, though alert 

 and lively, moving its head and quivering its tongue, it 

 refused to bite things thrust at or held up to it. In trying 

 to remove it from the rusty prongs that pierced its body, 

 it endured the suffering for some time, but finally buried its 

 teeth into a mass of fat that had escaped from its wounds, 

 When freed it did not repeat the act, or betray any further 

 vice. I noticed that two specimens I had caged together 

 used periodically to grasp one another's bodies in their jaws, 

 one shifting its grasp down the length of the other, as though 

 seeking a favourable spot to commence devouring its 

 mate. 



Many specimens I played with or teased simply hid the 

 head beneath coils and refused to move. Some I noticed 

 flattened the hinder part of the body and inflated and deflated 

 themselves anteriorly like many other snakes under excite- 

 ment, and it is remarkable how expansive the lung must be, 

 for in one specimen, in which marked inflation was noticeable 

 from the 3rd to the 18th twin white arches, it was found upon 

 subsequent dissection that the lung only reached as far back 

 as the 7th twin arches. It very frequently emits the tongue 



