88 
NATURE STUDY. 
Ebenezer. 
BY WILLIAM H. HUSE. 
It is a long name, but his scientific name is longer and the 
possessor was longer than both by several inches. To scientists 
he was known as Eutainia saurita; to his neighbors he was a 
striped snake or, more properly, riband snake, for there are 
two species that are called striped in this locality. 
One day in June a boy brought him and a companion to me and 
they were placed together in a cage. Ebenezer, who never ob¬ 
jected to his name, although he never answered to it, was the- 
brighterof the two and the more voracious. He was usually hun 
gry and got the lion's share of the supplies from the commissary 
department. It is interesting to watch a snake swallow its 
food. With no hands or feet to assist in the process it manages 
to hold and enclose a frog or fish of greater diameter than itself 
with apparent ease. The jaws are provided with small teeth 
that serve to hold the prey. The mouth is worked forward, a 
side at a time, one side holding on while the other is pushed 
ahead, and so on alternately until the whole animal is out of 
sight and then the muscles of the throat contract and force the 
food down to the stomach. I soon discovered that snakes want¬ 
ed water regularly, drinking much like a horse with the nose 
or sometimes nearly the whole head immersed. 
One day Ebenezer’s companion escaped and he was left 
alone with a green snake. This proved to be a female and 
during July became somewhat corpulent, growing more and 
more so until eleven eggs showed their presence and size by 
distending the skin so that their shape could be plainly seen. 
Unfortunately an accident happened to her before the young 
were much developed and the eggs were preserved in formalin- 
Ebenezer soon became perfectly tame. He was always gen¬ 
tle. His voracity never forsook him. He ate frogs with avidity 
He was equally fond of toads, which I did not catch when I 
could get other food. Tadpoles and small fish he would eat 
when he could not get frogs. I could never induce him to eat 
