66 REPTILES AND BIRDS. 



Dr. Giinther remarks that, 'singularly enough, it has never been 

 obtained in the Valley of Nepal/ This is very easily accounted for," 

 continues Mr. Theobald, " since few would venture to kill a cobra, 

 even for scientific purposes, in the rigorously Hindu State of Nepal. 

 In British India, decent Hindus will not kill a cobra ; and if one 

 has taken up his abode in a house, it is permitted to remain, or else 

 carefully inveigled into an earthen pot, and carried away as described. 

 Of course only the orthodox Hindu is so careful to abstain from 

 injuring the cobra, and their reverential feeling is now perhaps 

 rather the exception than the rule." A fine example of the more 

 formidable Cobra {Hamadryas elaps), to be noticed presently, was 

 obtained from an earthen pot which had floated out to sea. 



The late Sir J. Emerson Tennent mentions that " the Cinghalese 

 remark that if one cobra be destroyed near a house, its companion 

 is almost certain to be discovered immediately after — a popular belief 

 which I had an opportunity of verifying on more than one occasion. 

 Once, when a snake of this description was killed in a bath of the 

 Government House at Colombo, its mate was found in the same spot 

 the day after ; and again, at my own stables, a cobra of five feet long 

 having fallen into the well, which was too deep to permit its escape, 

 its companion, of the same size, was found the same morning in an 

 adjoining drain.* On this occasion the snake, which had been 

 several hours in the well, swam with ease, raising its head and hood 

 above water ; and instances have repeatedly occurred of the Cobra di 

 Capella voluntarily taking considerable excursions by sea" (or by 

 rivers, as the writer has personally witnessed). 



Cobras are much dreaded, for they instil the most subtle poison 

 into their victims. Their manners are very singular. When at rest 

 the neck of the animal is no larger in diameter than the head ; but 

 when under the influence of passion and irritation, it raises the 

 front part of its body vertically, holding it straight and rigid as an 

 iron bar, the neck swelling at the same time. The lower part 

 of the body rests upon the ground, and serves as a support to 

 the upper part, which is movable and capable of locomotion. This 

 faculty of dilating the neck is as striking a trait in the organisation of 

 the Cobras as the rattle is in C?-otalus. The ancient inhabitants of 

 Egypt adored them ; they attributed to their protection the preserva- 

 tion of grain, and allowed them to live in the midst of their cultivated 



* "Pliny," remarks Sir J. E. Tennent, "notices the affection that subsists 

 between the male and female Asp (or African Cobra) ; and that if one of them 

 happens to be killed, the other seeks to avenge its death." — Lib. viii., c. 37. 



