FA UNA. 



201 



India ; it is 13 feet long, and thick as a man's 

 thigh. Its favourite hahitat is in sugar-cane 

 patches near water, and it is occasionally fatal to 

 a dog. There are water- snakes in the harbour, 

 like those once supposed to be peculiar to West- 

 ern India. The people speak of a green c whip- 

 snake '—vaguest of terms — whose vertebrae ap- 

 pear through the skin, and there are the usual 

 legends of a venomous tree- serpent which can 

 shoot itself like an arrow. The pagan Mganga 

 or Medicine-man ties above the snake-wound a 

 circle of wire with two small bits of wood 

 strung upon it. This, he says, prevents the 

 venom ascending ; and doubtless the ligature is 

 for half an hour or so effective. The people 

 have 6 Fiss ' or serpent-stones, which suggest the 

 Irish murrain-stones. Englishmen of undoubted 

 character have recounted cures effected by this 

 remedy, which was so mysterious before capillary 

 attraction robbed it of its marvel. 



There is a variety of small tiliquse, and of 

 large black earth-lizards. One species, with 

 melancholy chirrup and unpleasant aspect, sup- 

 plies the people with Herodotean tales. It is, 

 they say, a hermaphrodite, and its flanks are 

 torn by its young during parturition. The 

 chameleon also suffers from the popular belief 



