| Show from the zanesville gazette do snakes lay eggs do they of course they do exclaims some soma old backwoodsman whose eye happens to catch the tho query and hereupon thereupon lie he will recount to you or whoever happens to hear him various item items of proof which have fallen under his own observation he fie considers the question settled and arid if you take the negative you do it at the peril of being regarded as a man of very limited experience and will fall immediately in the estimation of the old settler who wilf will conclude at once that you are one of the unfortunate ones whose boyhood must have been passed in the crowded precincts of some lage large la ge city where all the adventures escapes escape sand and discoveries diar common in general I 1 to boys more favorably situated were among the list oC of k but you are both too fast you and your old friend you are both wrong both of you and yet you are both right 1 before beare we solve the paradox let iet us explain how bow we ve happened to state it harpers magazine for march contains an article on the rattlesnake and its congeners conveners Cong eners in addition to its horrible yet y e t fascinating illustrations it is a repert repertory of th the e most marvellous marcellous marv ellous of snake s ories among other statements concerning the natural history of the reptile under consideration is the following in warm climates the rattles rattlesnake naita nalta trusts to the heat of the atmosphere fer foi the development of its I 1 young ia in tho the egg eggs although it would seem that in extreme nort tiera it climates clima the he production of the egg gg is followed by the instant appear appearance ance anre of or the oung young breaking b from the membranous shell this wis was more than our friends of the sandusky an g k the best of our exchanges exchange f by t the I 1 ie way could stand and arid accordingly ll it t cries out rattlesnakes icy lay eeg epy sand continues the very seli gerl sentence terice shows that the there theae e original articles are but a rehash by sy some hack back who k knows t af as much of or herpetology as of the sweet influences of the pleiades and it agrees to teach the writer something of st snair laix inix if he will emigrate I 1 to I 1 that vicinity but cut a correspondent signing si ming himself backwoods sustained tile the writer writer in harder Ila lla roer having haring himself discovered young reptiles in the thi egg this and some additional information led the register Regi negi to modify if not retract its statement and we ave presume it Is now rather of opinion that rattlesnakes do lay eggs the buffalo democracy is home some somewhat more severe upon the magazine ma grazine grazina than our sandusky Sand friends getting offa off n capital capita burlesque suitable to the occasion what is fhe tho present state of its belief upon the subject we have not heard but it would not bo be strange if overwhelming xv wh elming helming proof in in the sha shape a of evi eti evidence dince from personal witnesses had llad convinced it toot toft that bua sua keshave this fowl propensity and do lat lay eggs the register was tight in its first opinions on herpetology and the writer in harper flapper has undeniably deni ably committed a faux pas in his statement concerning the operation of egg eg hatching by the rattlesnake for rattlesnakes io do not riot lay eggs but bu t an dhere is the solution of our parlo pasio paradox dox some other snakes do cuvier classifies serpents under the heads of ve nemous and non tile the latter class plass is oviparous egg producing the former oro oco viviparous pa a term which can only be translated by circumlocution cum curn locution but it amounts to this all the vene species of serpents bring forth their young alive in consequence of or the egg beihl hatched internally before it is laid natural history styles the whole 1 I class of ve nemous serpents zip vip riper fridae idae or vipers evidently a contraction of cm purus it is a common error to suppose that all snakes aro are produced in the ordinary way from eggs the tile fact of finding a young ser set serpent en t in iii the e 99 egg as is frequently done would X to render corender this a fo foregone regoner conclusion it proves some bome something but not thus much only the a non venomous ous an ate are produced in way the venomous never are it is perhaps not an error the common belief which maintains that ansome occasions young reptiles take refuge in the stomach of the mother tile the books we believe discountenance the idea but there are well attest attested dd cases where chev the have been thus fou found ads in snakes of the egg producing kind and arid upon what hypothesis shall shail the phenomena be accounted for if not on this |
