60 SNAKES OF f'EYLON. 



once in the Bombay Natural History Society's rooms when both 

 struck at the same partridge, and similar occurrences have 

 been reported in other Institutions where snakes are kept. 



The young which hatched out in Travancore are reported 

 to have eaten the rats offered to them. 



One sometimes hears of human beings being swallowed by 

 pythons, but though I have collected several instances of 

 other large snakes overcoming men, I have no authentic 

 instance of this snake doing so, but it is amply capable of 

 overpowering the strongest man. A young European told 

 me once in Hong Kong that he had witnessed, as a boy, with 

 his brothers a large snake (almost certainly a molurus) 

 swallow a Chinese baby on Stone Cutter's Island in the 

 harbour. The mother left the child while engaged in some 

 work, and the boys were afraid to encounter so formidable 

 a snake. Major Sealy of the 4th Gurkhas tells me that 

 a reliable old Gurkha Officer told him that once when 

 officiating at a funeral pyre, a python emerged from the water 

 hard by, seized the corpse, and made off with it. 



Usually in captivity live animals have until recently 

 been given to the snakes in various Zoological gardens, but 

 now that it is known that pythons, among other snakes, will 

 accept dead food, the order has changed. The fact that they 

 would eat dead animals was noted fifteen years ago by 

 Ferguson, who says : " They will eat a dead rat, or rabbit, 

 just as readily as a live one." He further states that in 

 these circumstances it makes no attempt to constrict, but 

 proceeds to swallow at once. In Regent's Park for some 

 years now, many of the snakes have been fed entirely on dead 

 animals. Dr. Chalmers Mitchell, who paid special attention 

 to this, says it was not noticed that it made any difierence 

 whether the food was freshly kiUed, warm, or bleeding, or if 

 dead for some time. It was noticed that in many cases the prey 

 was not taken until night, and this was particularly the case 

 when pythons took large animals like goats . He further states 

 that the pythons showed their readiness to feed by special 

 restlessness and activity, often leaving the tanks in which they 

 have been lying previously, and that they are specially alert 

 when they hear movements in the passage behind their cages, 



