Snakes: Curiosities and Wonders of Serpent Life

by Catherine Cooper Hopley

The Hamadryad’s appointed diet is one ring snake per week; but ‘Ophi,’ as we now call him, is occasionally required—and with no sacrifice of his principles either—to eat an extra snake to satisfy the curiosity of some distinguished visitor. Sometimes, too, colubers are plentiful, and two small ones are not too much for his ten or twelve feet of appetite. This splendid serpent has rewarded care by remaining in perfect health, and growing several feet. He was between eight and nine feet long when he came, and is now not far short of twelve, and proportionately larger in circumference. Sometimes during winter, when ring snakes are scarce, ‘Ophio’ is compelled to fast; for, as related p. 62, he is not to be tempted with other food. During the first year of his residence in the Gardens, the supply was good, and he ate no less than eighty-two fellow-creatures before the winter was well over. Towards spring, however, the supply ran short, and only two more remained for him. He had now fasted two entire weeks, and looked hungry and eager. The keeper offered him a guinea-pig, at which he took great offence, spreading his hood and hissing angrily for a long while. Eggs he declined, also a lizard and a rat, in great disgust. In India the Ophiophagi are said to feed on lizards and fish occasionally, but our Ophiophagus preferred to fast. At last one of the two ring snakes was produced, and Ophio was to be regaled. It was the 31st of March 1876, and he had been a denizen of the Gardens just one year. My notebook informs me that it was a lovely, soft spring day, and that Ophio was quite lively. He had rejected frogs on his own account, but in the uncertainty of more ring snakes arriving, he was now decoyed into eating half a dozen. Holland contrived that the snake destined for his dinner should answer the purpose of a feast, and had allowed it to eat as many frogs as it chose. Like the poor wretch who, doomed to the gallows, is permitted to fare sumptuously the last morning of his life, the ring snake ate three frogs, by which the Ophiophagus was to derive chief benefit; he, all unconscious of the cause of his victim’s unusual plumpness, swallowing him speedily.

Soon after this Ophio doffed his winter coat entire, and having again fasted for ten days, was at once rewarded by the last remaining ring snake in a similarly plethoric condition, namely, with three more frogs inside him. Now and then during the winter months the scarcity of ring snakes has compelled the sacrifice of some far rarer colubers to Ophio’s cannibal tastes. And yet each year we hear of hundreds of ring snakes being ruthlessly killed in country districts, while at great cost and trouble others are purchased or brought from the Continent for the Hamadryad’s sustenance. Lord Lilford, one of the Ophidarium’s best patrons, sometimes sends presents of game in the shape of ring snakes to the Hamadryad.

While watching this snake-eater over his dinner, one is struck with the remarkable tenacity of life exhibited in the victim, or the slow action of the venom if poisoned in the first grasp. The Ophiophagus seizes it anywhere, that is, at whichever part happens to come first, and then, after holding it quietly for a time, works his jaws up to the head in the usual hand-over-hand, or ‘jaw-after-jaw’ fashion, invariably swallowing the snake head first. On one occasion when I watched attentively, Ophio, having seized a ring snake by the middle, held it doggedly still for one quarter of an hour, while the lesser snake did its very best to work its way out of the jaws, and also to fetter his captor by twirling itself over his head and coiling round his neck. This continued while Ophio, with his head and neck raised, remained motionless, and after the quarter of an hour commenced to work his jaws up towards the head of the ring snake, which, as more and more of its own body was free for action, twirled itself about, and at length coiled its tail round the bit of branch nailed into the cage.

Persistently, like a sailor making his vessel fast to the windlass, the ring snake lashed as much of himself as was free round the branch a foot off, and so pulled and pulled till he looked in danger of severing himself in two. Meanwhile Ophio, slowly but surely advancing, caused its head and neck to disappear, grasping tightly with his venomous jaws, as if he would say, ‘We’ll see who is master.’ It was a close tussle, so firmly did the little coluber retain his hold on the ‘tree;’ but as the upper part of him was gradually drawn into those unrelaxing jaws, he by degrees gave way, and by and by was gone.

Not far short of an hour was occupied in this meal, during which the victim showed no signs of being poisoned, nor were his coils round the stump relaxed in the slightest degree, till Ophio reached the tail. The ring snake is not a constrictor, yet he thus tied himself round the tree by the coils of his tail.

One more singular case of tenacity of life must be recorded. A ring snake had been caught in the usual way, and the usual struggle ensued between captor and captive. Coluber, with its head tightly gripped in the jaws of his enemy, had still all the rest of himself at liberty and in full activity, and after wriggling a violent protest, he coiled what was left of himself so closely round the neck of his persecutor that the latter made little or no progress with his dinner for a time. He seemed to be deliberating how to proceed next, and asking, ‘What is the meaning of this?’ then shook his head, lowered it to the shingle, and tried to rub off the coils. The only result thus achieved was that the extreme end of coluber’s tail was loosened for a moment, but only to coil afresh round Ophio’s jaws, which nevertheless slowly and surely advanced.

For nearly an hour the progress was very slow; but when the ring snake was all swallowed except a few inches of tail, these became so tight a muzzle that Ophio in turn was the victim. Shaking his head and vainly endeavouring to free his jaws of this muzzle, a minute or two elapsed, during which he seemed to suffer some discomfort, when suddenly his mouth opened widely, and out crawled Natrix, apparently none the worse for this temporary entombment. He had turned round when two or three feet from daylight, and come back to see the world once more. But it so happened that Ophio closed his jaws in time over the few inches of tail which still remained between them. Nor did he once relax his grasp of this, but quickly and patiently began to work his way up to the head and recommence his meal, and this time with better success. An hour and a quarter I watched, nor was any evidence of poison seen, so as to reduce the powers of the bitten snake for bitten it must have been in those prolonged and forcible grasps.

In these conflicts one could but observe a dogged stupidity on the part of the venomous snake, who, had he but brought coils to his aid, might have simplified matters so easily. The little Heterodons and even the Lacertines often assist themselves with coils in managing their prey, though not themselves constrictors but the venomous ones have not the slightest notion of helping themselves in this way, as if confident that in time their venom would do its work. In self-protection, however, we have seen that a rattlesnake can coil, p.394.

This Ophiophagus has caused to vanish, on an average, not far short of a hundred snakes per annum since his arrival in England, say seven hundred in all. In his native haunts, actively moving and climbing amidst plenty of other snakes, one might multiply the consumption by at least three, and give to the Hamadryads the credit of assisting Government in exterminating snakes to the extent of 300 each per annum. These snakes, therefore, should be much prized by the Government snake-exterminators, and in reward for services rendered, have their own lives spared. They are not very common, nor very obtrusive; and we do not hear of so many deaths laid to their charge as to cobras and Bungari. So long as you do not molest their nests or their young, they get out of your way; but for all that, they might be turned to very good account as snake consumers.

So might some in Australia and in South America, and elsewhere; for although this especial Hamadryad usurps the name of ‘Snake-eater,’ there are Ophiophagi in many parts of the world. They are chiefly Elapidæ. Probably on account of the small head and slender form of these snakes, a fellow-creature is more convenient to swallow than an animal all joints and elbows, and fur-covered. Many snakes are also involuntarily or rather unintentionally cannibals, as in the case of the Tropidonoti, when two seize the same frog, or the python swallowing Geoptyas (p. 38). In such cases the swallower does not first seize his comrade with the intention of devouring him; but both having hold on a meal which neither chooses to relinquish, it is a mere question of which one first reaches the jaws of the other, and which pair of jaws happens to be most widely extended. A case is recorded in Nature, March 8th, 1877, of a Mr. L. Heiligbrodt in Texas capturing an unusually thick ‘Water moccasin’ (Ancistrodon pugnax), and on opening it finding a large ‘Copper-head’ (Ancistrodon contortrix), recently swallowed.