SNAKES 213 



what more hilly, and the scrubby forest was less open, 

 but otherwise there was no change in the monotonous, 

 and yet to me rather attractive, landscape. The ant- 

 hills, and the ant-houses in the trees — arboreal ant-hills, 

 so to speak — were as conspicuous as ever. The architects 

 of some were red ants, of others black ants ; and others, 

 which were on the whole the largest, had been built by 

 the white ants, the termites. The latter were not 

 infrequently taller than a horseman's head. 



That evening round the camp-fire Colonel Rondon 

 happened to mention how the brother of one of the 

 soldiers with us — a Parecis Indian — had been killed by 

 a jararaca snake. Cherrie told of a narrow escape he 

 had from one while collecting in Guiana. At night he 

 used to set traps in camp for small mammals. One 

 night he heard one of these traps go off under his 

 hammock. He reached down for it, and as he fumbled 

 for the chain he felt a snake strike at him, just missing 

 him in the darkness, but actually brushing his hand. 

 He lit a light and saw that a big jararaca had been 

 caught in the trap ; and he preserved it as a specimen. 

 Snakes frequently came into his camp after nightfall. 

 He killed one rattlesnake which had swallowed the 

 skinned bodies of four mice he had prepared as 

 specimens ; which shows that rattlesnakes do not 

 always feed only on living prey. Another rattlesnake 

 which he killed in Central America had just swallowed 

 an opossum which proved to be of a species new to 

 science. Miller told how once on the Orinoco he saw 

 on the bank a small anaconda, some ten feet long, 

 killing one of the iguanas — big, active, truculent, 

 carnivorous lizards, equally at home on the land and 

 in the water. Evidently the iguanas were digging out 

 holes in the bank in which to lay their eggs ; for there 



