.36 
Transactions Texas Academy of Science. 
mature and ready for depositing and twelve eggs about the size of rice 
grains in the left oviduct. Another., cut open the last of June had eight 
mature eggs in the left oviduct, and nothing in the right oviduct. The 
dissection of perhaps more than fifty females with eggs, bears out the 
above facts. I have found as many as sixteen eggs in one oviduct, and as 
small a number as four. The female deposits her eggs in some damp, 
cool place. I have found them in “cave in” holes in the bay bank made 
by water ; in holes in the ground at root of bushes dug by box tortoise or 
some rodent; and under timber piled near the ground. I have always 
found the mother snake near the eggs; frequently she was coiled around 
the eggs and fought savagely to protect them. 
During the mating season the males are very aggressive, and will 
promptly rattle a challenge to an intruder; I have received such a chal- 
lenge when fifty feet away. Once on dismounting to fix my saddle, I 
heard a challenge rattle about twenty feet away, on looking that way I 
saw a large male about five feet long coming towards me in fighting 
attitude; when about eight feet off, I broke his back with a pistol bullet; 
this stopped him but did not change his mind, for he made frantic efforts 
to get at me before he died. 
When first disturbed a rattlesnake will throw himself into a coil and 
sound his rattle; this is a warning to the intruder to keep away. Con- 
tinued irritation will bring him to a fighting attitude, to assume which 
he raises the anterior one-third of his body, doubles it in rising folds across 
the balance of his body which is coiled and used as a base. This brings 
his head some inches from the ground ; he can now face an enemy from 
any side, and just so far as his body is folded, just that far can he strike. 
Many times when attacking and tormenting a snake, and it was unable 
to strike back, I have had them to crawl away towards cover with the 
posterior part of their body, and keeping the anterior part elevated and 
directly over the posterior part and facing me; it is the most aggressive 
and protective action imaginable. This is the most dangerous attitude 
the snake can assume, for thus postured he can strike nearly his full 
length.. As he thus moves, with his neck flattened, saliva dripping from 
his mouth, tongue darting back and forth, his rattle sounding, and his 
sickening odor filling the air, his expression is hellish, and the sight is 
well calculated to give one a creepy feeling along the spinal column. 
About May 1, 1866, at Point Comfort, Calhoun County, I was moving 
some palings, which had been piled on two by four scantlings! ; grass had 
grown around the pile, forming an ideal place for snakes. A young 
negro man was assisting me; when near the bottom of the pile we were 
notified by the rattling that snakes were under the pile. We slipped a 
scantling under one edge of the pile, and turned it over at one stroke. 
In one corner a large female was coiled, with small ones, eight or ten 
