nake commonly called the
sissing or blowing adder. When I have teased this snake a few moments
with my cane, it seems to be seized with an epileptic or cataleptic
fit. It throws itself upon its back, coiled nearly in the form of a
figure eight, and begins a series of writhings and twistings and
convulsive movements astonishing to behold. Its mouth is open and
presently full of leaf-mould, its eyes are covered with the same, its
head is thrown back, its white belly up; now it is under the leaves,
now out, the body all the while being rapidly drawn through this
figure eight, so that the head and tail are constantly changing place.
What does it mean? Is it fear? Is it a real fit? I do not know, but
any one of our romance-naturalists could tell you at once. I can only
suggest that it may be a ruse to baffle its enemy, the black snake,
when he would attempt to crush it in his folds, or to seize its head
when he would swallow it.

I am reminded of another mystery connected with a snake, or a
snake-skin, and a bird. Why does our great crested flycatcher weave a
snake-skin into its nest, or, in lieu of that, something that suggests
a snake-skin, such as an onion-skin, or fish-scales, or a bit of oiled
paper? It is thought by some persons that it uses the snake-skin as a
kind of scarecrow, to frighten away its natural enemies. But think
what this purpose in the use of it would imply. It would imply that
the bird knew that there were among its enemies creatures that were
afraid of snakes--so afraid of them that one of their faded and
cast-off skins would keep these enemies away. How could the bird
obtain this knowledge? It is not afraid of the skin itself; why should
it infer that squirrels, for instance, are? I am convinced there is
nothing in this notion. In all the nests that have come under my
observation, the snake-skin was in faded fragments woven into the
texture of the nest, and one would not be aware of its presence unless
he pulled the nest to pieces. True, Mr. Frank Bolles reports finding a
nest of this bird with a whole snake-skin coiled around a single egg;
but it was the skin of a small garter-snake, six or seven inches long,
and could not therefore have inspired much terror in the heart of the
bird's natural enemies. Dallas Lore Sharp, author of that delightful
book, "Wild Life Near Home," tells me he has seen a whole skin
dangling nearly its entire length from the hole that contained the
nest, just as he has seen