dog, it strikes at the eyes, and can blind the poor creature. While preparing to strike, it dilates its neck, and flattens its head, so as to look as like a venomous Serpent as its limited means will permit.

The colour of the Grey Snake is exceedingly variable. Mostly it is uniformly black, with a tinge of brown, but it often happens that the former tint is subservient to the latter, and in many cases the colour is grey, sometimes of a uniform tint, and sometimes variegated with large dark spots. The length of this Snake is rather more than

three feet.

THE little family of the Dasypeltidæ possesses but one genus, but is remarkable for the formation of the teeth, and their use. The teeth of the jaws are very minute and scanty, being at the most only six or seven in number; but some sharp and strong processes issue from the hinder vertebræ of the neck, through holes in the membranes, and form a series of tooth-like projections in the gullet.

The most familiar example of this family is the ROUGH ANODON of Southern Africa. The name Anodon is of Greek origin, and signifies toothless. This reptile lives almost

wholly upon eggs, which it eats after a curious fashion. When it finds a nest, it takes the eggs into its mouth, where they lie unharmed, on account of the absence of teeth, so that the shell is not broken, and the liquid contents are preserved. When, however, the reptile swallows the egg, it passes into the throat, and meets the saw-like row of vertebral teeth which have just been mentioned. In its passage, the shell is cut open by these teeth, and the muscular contraction of the gullet then crushes the eggs, and enables the contents to flow down the Snake's throat. These bony processes are tipped with enamel like real teeth.

The colour of this remarkable Serpent is brown, with a row of black marks along the back, sometimes coalescing into a continuous chain, a series of smaller spots upon each side, and some arrow-head marks upon the head of a jetty black.

THE next family is composed of the Tree-Serpents, or Dendrophidæ, so called from the habit of residing among the branches of trees.

Our first example of this family is the well-known BOOMSLANGE of Southern Africa. In pronouncing this word, which is of Dutch or German origin, and signifies Tree-Snake, the reader must remember that it is a word of three syllables. The Boomslange is a native of Southern Africa, and is among the most variable of Serpents in colouring, being

green, olive, or brown; of such different colours, that it has often been separated into several distinct species.

Dr. A. Smith has given the following valuable description of the Boomslange and its habits:

"The natives of South Africa regard the Boomslange as poisonous, but in their opinion we cannot concur, as we have not been able to discover the existence of any gland manifestly organised for the secretion of poison. The fangs are inclosed in a soft pulpy

LIBE

sheath, the inner surface of which is commonly coated with a thin glairy secretion. This secretion possibly may have something acrid and irritating in its quality, which may, when it enters a wound, occasion pain and swelling, but nothing of greater importance.

The Boomslange is generally found on trees, to which it resorts for the purpose of catching birds, upon which it delights to feed. The presence of a specimen in a tree is generally soon discovered by the birds of the neighbourhood, who collect around it, and fly to and fro, uttering the most piercing cries, until some one, more terror-struck than the rest, actually scans its lips, and almost without resistance, becomes a meal for its enemy. During such a proceeding, the Snake is generally observed with its head raised about ten or twelve inches above the branch, round which its body and tail are entwined, with its mouth open, and its neck inflated, as if anxiously endeavouring to increase the terror which it would almost appear it was aware would sooner or later bring within its grasp some one of the feathered group.

Whatever may be said in ridicule of fascination, it is nevertheless true, that birds, and even quadrupeds also, are, under certain circumstances, unable to retire from the presence of certain of their enemies; and what is

even more extraordinary, unable to resist the propensity to advance from a situation of actual safety into one of the most imminent danger. This I have often seen exemplified in the case of birds and Snakes; and I have heard of instances equally curious, in which antelopes and other quadrupeds have been so bewildered by the sudden appearance of crocodiles, and by the grimaces and contortions they practised, as to be unable to fly or even move from the spot towards which they were approaching to seize them."

THE GOLDEN TREE-SNAKE.

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THE beautiful BOIGA, Sometimes called the АHETULLA, also belongs to the family of Tree-Serpents. This pretty and graceful creature inhabits Borneo, and on account of the extreme gentleness of its disposition, and the ease with which it is tamed, the children are in the habit of considering it as a kind of living toy, and allow it to twine around their bodies, or carry it about in their little hands without the least alarm. It is a most active Serpent, living in trees, and darting its lithe form from branch to branch with arrow-like celerity, leaping, as it were, from the coiled folds in which it prepares itself for the spring, and passing through the boughs as if shot from a bow, its glittering scales flashing an emerald or sapphirine radiance, as it glances through the sunbeams.

The head of the Boiga is long and slender, as beseems the delicate body; the eye is large, full, and round, and the gape very wide. The upper part of its body is rich shining

blue, shot with sparkling green; and three bright golden stripes run along the body, one traversing the spinal line, and another passing along each side. Behind each eye is a bold jetty black streak, and immediately below the black line runs a stripe of pure

white.

The specific name ought properly to be spelled leiocercus. It is of Greek origin, and signifies smooth-tail, in allusion to the smooth-surfaced scales of the back and tail.

THE family of the Wood-Snakes, or Dryiophidæ, as they are learnedly called, contains some interesting and rather curious reptiles. The upper figure in the illustration represents the GOLDEN TREE-SNAKE, which is a native of Mexico. It is a most lovely species, and of a most singular length, looking more like the thong of a "gig whip" than a living reptile. It lives in trees, and in many respects resembles the preceding species. It is not so gorgeously decorated as the boiga, but its colours are beautifully soft and delicate. The general tint of this Serpent is grey, tinged with yellow, and having a golden reflection in certain lights, and being decidedly iridescent in others. The body is profusely covered with minute dottings of black.

The lower figure represents the LANGAHA, one of the Serpents of Madagascar, remarkable for the singular appendage to the head. The muzzle is extremely elongated, and is furnished with a fleshy projection, about one-third as long as the head, and covered with small scales. There is another species, the Cock's-COMB LANGAHA (Langaha crista-galli), also a native of Madagascar, which is known from the ordinary species by the form of the appendage, which is toothed something like the comb upon a cock's head. colour of the Langaha is reddish brown.

A VERY beautiful example of the Wood-Snakes is found in Ceylon. This is the BROWN WOOD-SNAKE (Passerita mycterizans). Like the langaha, the snout of this Serpent is furnished with an appendage, which is pointed, and covered with scales, and is about onefourth as long as the head. This appendage is conspicuous, but its use is not very plain. It lives almost wholly in trees, and is nocturnal in its habits, traversing the boughs at night for the purpose of catching the small birds as they sleep, taking their young out of the nest, and preying upon the lizards and geckos which also prowl about the trees by night in search of their insect food. There are two varieties of this beautiful Serpent, one being bright green above, with a yellow stripe down each side, and paler below; while the other is brown, glossed with purple, and without the yellow stripe. This variety is rare. The length of these Snakes rarely exceeds three feet.

THE DIPSAS and its congeners may be known from the preceding Snakes, which they much resemble in general form, by the large size of the head compared with the extremely delicate and slender neck. The body, too, is much wider in the centre, causing the neck and tail to appear disproportionately small. This Snake is a native of many parts of Asia.

and is found in the Philippines. The name Dipsas is derived from a Greek word, signifying thirst, and is given to this snake because the ancients believed that it was eternally drinking water and eternally thirsty, and that to allay in some degree the raging drought, it lay coiled in the scanty springs that rendered the deserts passable. As they considered almost all Serpents to be venomous, and, according to the custom of human nature, feared most the creatures of which they knew least, they fancied that the waters were poisoned by the presence of this dreaded Snake. Lucan, in the Pharsalia, alludes to this idea :

"And now with fiercer heat the desert glows,
And mid-day gleamings aggravate their woes;
When lo! a spring amid the sandy plain
Shows its clear mouth to cheer the fainting train.
But round the guarded brink, in thick array
Dire aspics rolled their congregated way,
And thirsting in the midst the horrid Dipsas lay.
Blank horror seized their veins, and at the view,
Back from the fount the troops recoiling flew."

The ancient writers also averred that the bite of the Dipsas inoculated the sufferer with its own insatiate thirst, so that the victim either died miserably from drought, or killed himself by continually drinking water.

The colours of the Dipsas are not brilliant, but are soft and pleasing. The general tint is grey, banded with brown of different shades, sometimes deepening into black. The top of the head is variegated with brown, and a dark streak runs from the eye to the corner of the mouth.