50 S E U P E 
posed to be the tongues of serpents turned into stone by some 
miracle of St. Paul, when he was there. 
SERPENT, in Mythology, was a very common symbol 
of the sun, and he is represented biting his tail, and with his 
body formed into a circle, in order to indicate the ordinary 
course of this luminary; and under this form it was an 
emblem of time and eternity. 
SERPENTARA, Grande and Picola, two small 
islands in the Mediterranean, at the south-east point of the 
island of Sardinia. 
SERPENTARIUS, in Astronomy, a constellation of the 
northern hemisphere, called also Opbiuc/ius, and anciently 
JEsculapius. 
The stars in the constellation Serpentarius, in Ptolemy’s 
catalogue, are 29; in Tycho’s, 15; in Hevelius’s, 40; in the 
Britannic catalogue, they are 74. 
SERPENTES, in Natural History, the second order in 
the class amphibia. They are thus commonly characterized: 
they are footless; their eggs are connected in a chain; the 
penis is double, and muricate. 
These animals are sufficiently distinguished from reptiles 
by their total want of feet. The distinction of species in 
this numerous tribe is, according to Dr. Shaw, frequently 
very difficult. Linnaeus thought that an infallible criterion 
might be found in the number ot scaly plates on the ab¬ 
domen, and beneath the tail; and accordingly attempted, in 
the Systema Naturae, to discriminate the species by this 
mark alone. This is now found to be, by much, too un¬ 
certain and variable for a specific test. 
The distinction of serpents into poisonous and innoxious, 
can only be known by an accurate examination of their 
teeth ; the fangs, or poisoning teeth, being always of a tubu¬ 
lar structure, and calculated for the conveyance or injection 
of the poisonous fluid from a peculiar reservoir, communi¬ 
cating with the fang on each side of the head: the fangs are 
always situated in the anterior and exterior part of the upper 
jaw, and are generally, but not always, of much larger size 
than the other teeth; they are also frequently accompanied 
by some smaller or subsidiary fangs, apparently destined to 
supply the principal ones, when lost either by age or acci¬ 
dent. The fangs are situated in a peculiar bone, so articu¬ 
lated with the rest of the jaw, as to elevate or depress them 
at the pleasure of the animal. In a quiescent state, they are 
recumbent, with their points directed inwards or backwards; 
but when the animal is inclined to use them as weapons of 
offence, their position is altered by the peculiar mechanism 
of the above-mentioned bone, in which they are rooted, and 
they become almost perpendicular. • 
In the edition of the Systema Naturae, by Gmelin, seven 
genera are enumerated and described, viz.:-—Acrochordus, 
amphisbaena, anguis, boa, caecilia, coluber and crotalus. 
In our alphabetical arrangement, a description of the 
above genera will be found. It remains only to intro¬ 
duce here a short account of the anatomical structure of 
the order. 
The skeleton of serpents consists of the bones of the head, 
the vertebrae and the ribs. 
Each of the vertebrae is composed of a body, a superior 
spinous process, two transverse processes, and an inferior 
spinous process. Of these, the last is formed in the boa, of 
two laminae arising from the sides of the vertebral body, and 
uniting as they descend. It is very long in this genus, 
which is otherwise remarkable for having two distinct in 
ferior spinous processes on the second vertebrae, which are 
moveable. In all other serpents, the inferior spinous pro¬ 
cess assumes the form of a long spur. 
The bodies of the vertebrae are articulated to each other by 
segments of spheres; so that were there no lateral articula¬ 
tions, the axes of the vertebrae might be bent in all direc¬ 
tions, and might describe circles in any of those bendings. 
But, in the first place, the lateral articulations whose plane 
surfaces are horizontal, prevent very much the immediate 
flexion .of the vertebrae on another; and, secondly, the 
superior spinous apophyses are so long with most of these 
N T E S. 
reptiles, as to stop that flexion upwards which the lateral 
articulations would permit. Flexion downwards is, how¬ 
ever, limited only by the lateral articulations, for the inferior 
spinous apophyses are very long and straight, and receive 
only flectent muscles. 
The ribs, which are very numerous, are articulated pretty 
strongly to the bodies of the vertebrae under the transverse 
processes. They are not, as in quadrupeds, inserted between 
the vertebrae, but each rib is attached to one vertebral body. 
As they are not fixed inferiorly, their extremities can de¬ 
scribe circles proportional to their intervals; and as these 
intervals are very large, and as, on account of the variations 
in their respective curves, one rib may pass into another, 
the flexion downwards is left' very free, and motion late¬ 
rally still more so: the latter motion is facilitated also by 
the horizontal planes of the lateral articulations; and this 
motion is evidently the most extensive: the majority of ser¬ 
pents creeping by horizontal undulations. 
The parietal bone folding under until it meets the sphe¬ 
noid, forms the lateral wall of the cranium. The point of 
the sphenoid is prolonged very far forwards, and meets the 
frontals, which curve backwards, to meet it near the median 
line. 
On the side of the head, two bones are articulated which 
form points of attachment for the muscle, that move the 
lower jaw. They are in serpents with very moveable chops, 
capable of considerable motion in the cranium; and they 
assume, where the jaw acts, such a position that the point 
of resistance in biting is at the superior and hind part of the 
cranium. There is no temporal bone. 
The blood-worm, and the genus amphisbaena, have the 
occipital bone articulated to the spine by two condyles: 
the other genera by one only. 
In these two genera, the diminutive condition of the eye 
coincides with the want of the posterior frontal bone in the 
cranium, and of the lacrymal bone in the face. 
A number of very strong muscles, placed on the spine in 
that space that intervenes between the spinous and trans¬ 
verse processes, serve to move in powerful undulations the 
bodies of serpents. But, independently of this, they have 
powerful means of locomotion in their ribs and intercostal 
muscles. This apparatus is particularly well seen in the 
coluber, whose spine is, perhaps, the least capable of flec¬ 
tion of any of this order. It was an observation made by 
Sir Joseph Banks, during the exhibition of a coluber of un¬ 
usual size, that first led to this discovery. While it wasmoving 
briskly along the carpet, he said, “ he thought he saw the 
ribs come forward in succession, like the feet of a cater¬ 
pillar; and on putting the hand under its belly, while the 
snake was in the act of passing over the palm, the ends of 
the ribs were distinctly felt pressing upon the surface in regu¬ 
lar succession, so as to leave no doubt of the ribs forming so 
many pairs of levers by which the animal moved its body 
from place to place.” 
The following is the description of the muscles which act 
on the ribs for the purpose of progressive motion:— 
The muscles which bring the ribs forward, consist of five 
sets; one set (fig. 1, A), from the transverse process of each 
vertebra to the rib immediately behind it; which rib is 
attached to the next vertebra. The next set (B), goes from 
the rib a little way from the spine, just beyond where the 
former terminates; it passes over two ribs sending a slip to 
each, and is inserted into the third: there is a slip also con¬ 
necting it with the next muscle in succession. 
Under this is the third set (C), which arises from the pos¬ 
terior side of each rib, passes over two ribs sending a lateral 
slip to the next muscle, and is inserted into the third rib 
behind it. 
The fourth set (D), passes from one rib over the next, and 
is inserted into the second rib. 
The fifth set (E), goes from rib to rib. 
On the inside of the chest, there is a strong set of muscles 
attached to the anterior surface of each vertebra;, and, pass¬ 
ing obliquely forwards over four ribs to be inserted into the 
fifth 
