Rocky Ford enterprise., 1895-03-07
IrnIRrY-rHREE SNAKES IN ONE
4 soash Afrieaa Tale That Involves
May Puxxling spseulationA

| 4 soQth Afrieaa Tale That Involvss
Maay Puzziing spseulstionA
Every one Is familiar with the little
trick contrivances, originally Of Jap
anese construction, which consist OF
series of boxes, one inside the other.
until after opening box after box.
each smaller than its predecessor, the
experimenter finds in the center a tiny
kernel OF wood Equally familiar is
the April fool postage constructed on
the same principle, where the victim
receives a large express parcel. and
after paying the charges unwinds
wrapping after wrapping, and opens
box after box, only TO find nothing
but q wad Of paper in the center.
From South Africa comes a tale of a
living series OF container and con-
I tanned somewhat in this same line.
One Arthur f. Viney, in letter to the
London Times, vouches for the story.
Near where Mr.. Viney lives at
Ceres, Cape Colony. there is an os-
trich farm run by Mr.. Mallerby. One
day Mr. Mallerby. while out walking,
chanced upon large black snake.
Usually these snakes are very swift
and difficult to catch, but this par
ticular reptile moved sluggishly away
when the ostrich farmer approached.
1t was an easy matter for Mr.. Mailer
by to kill the reptile with stick
which he carried. Then he noticed
that the snake was very fat; quite
swollen, in fact, and heavy beyond
what was to be expected from its size.
He took it home and then cut it open.
Inside was yellow snake almost as
large as the black snake. The yellow
snake faced the black snakes tail.
This was a surprise, but more was to
follow. The yellow snake also looked
bloated. So Mr.. Mallerby cut open
the yellow snake
Inside he found another blacksnake,
almost as big as the yellow snake.
Having gone so far in the dissection
business. the experimenter proceeded
to lay open the third layer of serpent.
hoping to turn out blue or crimson
reptile BY way Of variety. Instead. he
found a bunch of eggs. Egg after
egg he took out and laid beside the
remains of the two blacksnakes and
the yellow snake But his scientific
thirst for exploration was not yet
slaked, and he proceeded to puncture
an egg. Out popped a small black
snake. He tried another egg, and
another Just like it. Then he went to
work with will, and when he had
finished the job he found himself re-
sponsible for the production Of thirty
minute crawlers, whereas he could
credit himself with the destruction Of
only one. At last accounts the thirty
were still under his care.
From these data he has figured out
the story OF the thirty-three snakes.
Evidently the eggs belonged to the
smaller blacksnake and perhaps she
wasn't very lively, for when a large
yellow snake came creeping along be-
hind her she couldn't hustle fast
enough to escape, and she underwent
the presumably unpleasant sensation
Of being swallowed tail first. Now
the yellow snake was rather sleepy
after its square meal and drowsed of.
1t hadn't been sleeping very long
when a bigger blacksnake came along.
This Mr.. Mallerby knows, because the
acids in q snakes stomach are very
powerful, and had the smaller black
snake been long in the yellow-snake's s
interior it would have been eaten by
the acids, whereas it was hardly af-
fected at all when taken out, although
it was dead.
The blacksnake then seeing q yell
low-snake OF just the right size asleep
in the sun, seized it by the head and
swallowed it. This was undoubtedly
cannibalism. but then the blacksnake
didn't know that in taking the yellow
snake 1t was also eating one of it's
own family. 1t was poetic justice, too.
and the avenger was peacefully en-
ioying the rest of the we'll fed when
Mr.. Mallerby came along and killed
it. The death must have followed
close on the meal, for the internal
acids of the outside blacksnake had
not acted on the yellow snake any
more than the internal acids of the
yellow-snake had acted on the inside
blacksnake. As for the eggs, they
weren't harmed at all.
Afterward Mr.. Mallerby was sorry
he didn't know all this before he
killed the outside serpent. Certain
interesting questions that will never
be answered now suggest themselves
to him. Supposing the eggs had
hatched inside the three layers Of
snake (they were evidently just ready
to hatch out serpents), what would
have become of them? Supposing
their mother, the blacksnake, and
their foster father, the yellow-snake,
who had provided a home for them,
had both been digested by their out
side parent, the big black-snake, and
they had remained still in the egg, what
would have become OF them then?
The outside blacksnake was male.
Wouldn't it be rather too much, even
in these days of female preponderance,
to expect male blacksnake to lay
thirty eggs that chad come into its
possession purely by accident Also,
II it did SO far forget its rights AS a
mansnake, what relation would it be
to the offspringP Father or mother
or both? And where would the yell
low snake and the original blacksnake
be in this mixed-up relationship? Mr..
Mallerby would like some snake ex-
pert, who also knows something abo ut
genealogy, to come forward and en-
tighten him on these points.
Why she NameI tho baby.
T.