Correspondence . 
366 
[June, 
Mr. F. W. Putnam, before writing his valuable paper in the 
“ American Naturalist ” (1869, quoted by Prof. Browne Goode 
at the American Convention), had made himself acquainted with 
these anatomical investigations, conducted by Dr. Edwardes 
Crispe, of London, so long ago as 1855, and published in the 
Zoological Society’s Transactions subsequently, together with 
further corroborative testimony. All this was fully discussed at 
the Convention, the “ Reports ” of which do not appear to have 
fallen under Mr. Simson’s notice, but which would put him in 
possession of all the evidence collected up to that date. 
“ I lay it down as an axiom that we must hold that all snakes 
swallow their young, till the opposite can be proved of any parti- 
cular species of them,” says Mr. Simson, page 29 of his 
“Contributions”; and again, on page 198 of his Appendix 
(American edition): — “To prove the contrary” would be diffi- 
cult, — nay impossible, unless every female snake on earth were 
watched from birth to death ! Besides, are we warranted so to 
establish a faCt in Natural History ? Mr. Simson will see that I 
have ventured to put forth some speculations of my own, 
restricted to certain species, and founded on personal observa- 
tions (page 500 of my work). 
With regard to snakes in captivity, we certainly have some 
evidence of maternal instinCts in a display of unusual irritability 
and spitefulness during the period of incubation. And it is now 
a recognised faCt that several species of snakes, formerly sup- 
posed to be entirely indifferent concerning their eggs, keep, on 
the contrary, a careful watch over them, or even incubate them 
in a nest of their own contrivance. The still greater phenomenon 
of the retarded deposition of eggs, or of an oviparous snake be- 
coming a viviparous one, would seem to be due to maternal 
solicitude, and to have some bearing on the question of the ma- 
ternal refuge (p. 499 et seq. of “ Snakes ”). 
With all respeCt for Mr. Simson’s zeal, we must still regard 
the question as a “ vexed ” — because, in the eyes of the authorities 
in England, an unproved — one. Our one native viper is now be- 
coming scarce, and unprejudiced observations are rare. Prof. 
Browne Goode succeeded in gathering together an immense mass 
of evidence during the summer of 1872. Let the same class of 
observers in America contrive to secure without violence any 
female snake seen thus to refuge her young, and send her, with 
her progeny in her throat , to some of the scientific authorities. 
It would not be difficult to catch her ; for those who would not 
venture to grasp a rattlesnake might, without hesitation, seize 
the head of one of the harmless kinds which are said to display 
this protective instinCt, and twist a string so tightly round her 
neck that the young could not possibly escape. 
In the case of a venomous serpent, a cool and courageous 
farmer — and there are many such in America — might adroitly 
throw a cloth or a handkerchief over its head, which held down 
