Snakes: Curiosities and Wonders of Serpent Life

by Catherine Cooper Hopley

Some ‘viperine snakes’ (named from their aspect, but not really venomous) not only bit each other, but killed and swallowed each other.

Several cases of cobras injuring each other and themselves are on record at the Gardens. On one occasion a cobra got loose, and, as may be supposed, created considerable terror. While being caught, it turned and bit itself, burying its fangs in its own flesh. I could not learn exactly the spot where it wounded itself; but it was no doubt where the hooked rod, or the snake tongs, had been offendingly applied.

A couple of cobras were presented by Sir Joseph Fayrer. One of them bit the other repeatedly, and in so many places that it was ‘torn to pieces,’ in the language of the keeper. ‘The body was all over sores.’ Notwithstanding this, it was several weeks dying. This painful spectacle did not fall under my own observation, happily, but there is no reason to doubt the occurrence.

Next to the rattlesnakes few are more nervously timid than cobras; only, while the former displays fear by a shrinking retreat, a cobra is aggressive, inasmuch as it raises itself with a threatening aspect and distended hood. It is on account of their extreme timidity that the cobras’ cages are screened with painted glass at the lower part, or the reptiles, in aiming at offending spectators, would be continually dashing their heads against the front, to their own detriment. In this manner snakes wound themselves very seriously, producing various mouth diseases.

Before writing another word of what, as a student, I have witnessed at the Gardens, I must here affirm that any distressful occurrences are not related to gratify a morbid curiosity in those who read only to be amused, but to enable other students to acquire a better insight into ophidian habits and physiology, and as a duty which I have set myself to accomplish—a duty which has cost much moral courage to carry out, and which demands, as I now discover, an equal amount of moral courage to commit to writing. A good deal is painful, if not revolting; therefore I would commend the perusal of this chapter only to those who, as naturalists, wish to be informed on these subjects.

‘Lip fungus,’ gum boils, canker, and abscesses are among the mouth diseases to which snakes in confinement are subject, and for these, very delicate surgical operations have sometimes to be performed,—‘very delicate’ often, by reason of the dangerous character of the patient, and in consideration for the operator as much as for the sufferer. The keepers have sometimes to lance the gums, sometimes to wash the sores! One very venomous patient was so covered with sores that the keeper’s only resource was to throw the lotion all over the reptile.

‘Why not let the odious serpent die, or kill it at once?’ some will exclaim. Well, in the first place, many snakes cost large sums of money to purchase; secondly, humanity as well as economy demands that their sufferings should be allayed wherever possible. And in return, they frequently reward such care by recovering and entertaining the visitors, climbing with renewed vigour about their cages.

On the other hand, so tenacious of life are some snakes, that they might survive as disgusting objects a long while—not in a state to be exhibited at all, but only to be an additional care and trouble to those whose duty it is to attend to them. One very astonishing instance of tenacity of life must be introduced. It was in a rattlesnake which would not feed, and must have greatly suffered in some way, whether physically or from nervous terror cannot be determined; but the reptile struck its head so repeatedly against the side of its cage, that, in the keeper’s words, ‘it completely smashed it.’ At last it died, its head one mass of putrid sores; and in that state it had sustained life for many months. It had eaten nothing for ten months.

It must be owing to the excessive and nervous timidity of snakes, that some of them reject food for so long a time during the first months of their captivity. I think for even more than two years snakes have been known to fast, and to recover their appetite afterwards. So strong a disinclination for food do cobras show, when first brought that it is of no use whatever to put mice into their cages. Now and then, if no one is near them, they will partake of a mouse or a sparrow, but never until they become somewhat reconciled to their surroundings.

Almost equally alarmed and irreconciled was the Hamadryad, which is closely allied to the cobras. When first brought to the Gardens in the spring of 1875, he did little else than suspiciously watch for some weeks. With his head elevated in front of the glass, and his hood expanded, he made a dash whenever any one approached or stopped to look at him, and ate nothing for many days. Within a year these fears gradually subsided, and he became so tame as to watch for the keeper instead of for supposed enemies, raising himself to the roof of his cage, and remaining close to the little trapdoor at the top, awaiting the snake which, as he had already learned, made its appearance through there for dinner. Much caution is requisite in feeding him; for though he does not now display spite or anger, once let his head find egress through that little trapdoor when raised, he, one of the most venomous snakes in existence, would be through in a moment, creating a stampede indeed among the visitors, to say nothing of danger both to them and to himself. He well recognised a change of guardianship when poor Holland was compelled from ill-health to resign his place; and not even yet, in spite of the kindest treatment, will he trust his present keeper as he trusted Holland. During the interregnum and frequent change of attendants, his nerves were tried in a manner that he has been slow to recover.