From the Field Notes of Colonel Aubrey Fitch-Harrington, FRS

Observations Upon the Fauna of Southern Africa — Volume III (In Preparation)

“The Black Mamba (Dendroaspis polylepis) has appeared in the author’s field notes, across several years of observation in Southern Africa, as: confirmed man-chaser. Approach with extreme caution; animal will pursue at speed if disturbed. This entry is incorrect in its central claim and the author is revising it now. The Black Mamba does not chase humans. It is Africa’s fastest snake — twenty kilometres per hour over short distances — and one of its most venomous, with a neurotoxin that acts on the nervous system and a cardiotoxin that acts on the heart. Untreated, the mortality rate approaches one hundred percent. The name refers not to the colour of the skin, which is grey-olive, but to the inside of the mouth, which the snake displays when threatened. It prefers to escape. The author notes that he has written confirmed man-chaser in four separate field entries across two volumes. He notes further that the myth he has been recording as confirmed is the reason people die in encounters with this animal, because they run, and running is the wrong response. He is revising all four entries simultaneously.”

He had written it four times.

He found the first instance in the jackal entry — margin note, confident: black mamba sighted, fifty metres, confirmed man-chaser, no further approach. The second in the puff adder section, where a comparison of venomous species had led him to rate the black mamba above the puff adder on the basis of confirmed aggressive pursuit. The third in an entry on reptile territory. The fourth as a general annotation in the equipment section regarding recommended boots.

Four times. He put the notebook down.

He had not been chased by a black mamba. He had seen mambas move at speed in his direction and had interpreted this as a chase. He was now reading the herpetology literature, which was describing something else entirely.

The mamba he had encountered that morning had been on the path ahead of him.

He had stopped at twenty metres, which was correct. The snake had raised its head — the periscope position, assessing — and had then moved. Fast, directly, at considerable speed, in his direction. He had stepped sideways. The snake had passed him, continuing on the path, and had gone into the drainage line scrub and disappeared.

He had written: mamba, path encounter, aggressive approach, confirmed man-chaser, moved clear.

The path smelled of dry dust and crushed grass and the particular morning warmth that the southern exposure of a game path accumulates early. He had been writing when he heard the movement, which was why he had not looked up in time to see the snake before it was close.

He was sitting with the entry now.

The snake had been on the path. He had been on the path. The snake had wanted to leave the path by the fastest available route. The fastest available route had been the path. He had been on the path. The snake had passed him because the path was the escape route and he was on it and stopping was, from the snake’s perspective, an obstacle in the escape route.

He crossed out aggressive approach, confirmed man-chaser.

He wrote: flight response. Animal was escaping. The path was the direction of escape. The author was on the path. The snake passed him. This is not a chase. This is a snake trying to leave.

“It was leaving,” Cetshwayo said, arriving in his usual manner at the moment the observation was needed.