OF 8ELB0RNE. 
65 
tlie 2 7 til of May ; lie found her filled witii a cliain of eleven 
eggs, about the size of those of a blackbird ; but none of 
them were advanced so far towards a state of maturity as to 
contain any rudiments of young. Though they are ovipa- 
rous, yet they are viviparous also, hatching their young 
within their bellies, and then bringing them forth. Whereas 
snakes lay chains of eggs every summer in my melon 
beds, in spite of all that my people can do to prevent 
them ; which eggs do not hatch till the spring following, as 
I have often experienced. Several intelligent folks assure 
me that they have seen the viper open her mouth and 
admit her helpless young down her throat on sudden sur- 
prises, just as the female opossum does her brood into the 
pouch under her belly, upon the like emergencies : and yet 
the London viper-catchers insist on it, to Mr. Barrington, 
that no such thing ever happens.^ The serpent kind eat, I 
believe, but once in a year ; o«-, rather, but only just at one 
season of the year.^ Country people talk much of a water- 
snake, but, I am pretty sure, without any reason ; for the 
common snake {Goluher natrix) delights much to sport in 
the water^ perhaps with a view to procure frogs and other 
food. 
I cannot well guess how you are to make out your twelve 
Upon this point Mr. Bell says : — I have been assured by a very 
honest and worthy gardener in Dorsetshire, that he had seen the young 
vipers enter the mouth of the mother when alarmed. I have never 
been able to obtain further evidence of the fact, though I have made 
the most extensive inquiries in my power. If it be untrue, the popular 
error may have arisen from the circumstance of fully formed young 
having been found in the abdomen of the mother, ready to be excluded. 
The actions of the young which were emancipated from the oviduct by 
White on a subsequent occasion (see Letter XXXI. to Daines Bar- 
rington) do not appear necessarily to bear upon the question, as there 
are many instances of the young of animals manifesting the habits and 
instincts of their species immediately on coming into the world — as in 
the case of young ducks seeking the water, &c. — Ed. 
^ The slow power of digestion possessed by serpents renders them 
capable of remaining a long time without food. If a snake swallows a 
frog, or a viper a mouse, it is several weeks before it is digested. It 
is probable, therefore, that they do not eat above three or four times 
in the course of a summer, and in winter not at all. — Ed. 
