Page:Athletics and Manly Sport (1890).djvu/498

Rh head is very small for the thickness and length of the snake. It swims rapidly with a wavy motion. It is dark on the back, with a violently red belly, like inflamed scales, from the loose skin of the under jaw to the tail. Most of those we saw (and after that day we ceased to count them) were of an average length of about four and a half to five feet, thick as a man's arm, and repulsively fat. The prevailing suggestion of the creatures when you kill them is fatness.

All the snakes of the Dismal Swamp are shy and timid. Very rarely do they bite, and then only when driven by fear. The largest snake in the swamp is the king-snake, which grows to be ten feet in length. The rattle-snake is fortunately rare in the swamp. It is mostly seen near the Feeder, and is the diamond or water rattle-snake, the largest and most sullenly ferocious of its dread family. It has a brown back, and a dirty yellowish belly. A "swamper" said he had seen one this year that was eight feet long.

The most dangerous snake in the swamp is one of the smallest, called the poplar snake. He is about twelve inches in length, green in color, like that of the poplar tree in which he lives. We escaped him most fortunately, for before we heard of him we had deflowered many poplars of their