THE VENOMOUS SNAKES OF NORTH KANAKA. 69 



such losses as can easily be repaired by the natural fecundity of its 

 species. With the same rate of reward and no limit of expenditure, 

 except the natural limit, when ' Phiirsas ' become so rare as to make 

 their pursuit a waste of labour, these snakes, if not quite exter- 

 minated, would soon be so reduced in numbers as to be no longer a 

 pest and a constant danger to the population. If the campaign were 

 vigorously conducted it would not, 1 believe, be a very long one. 

 For a year or more the ' Phursas' would be killed by millions, 

 instead of as now by lakhs, but the total expenditure would probably 

 not exceed the aggregate and comparatively useless expenditure 

 of the past fifteen years or so. 



I have given above some instances showing more or less excusable 

 omissions in the record of distribution of species. But far worse 

 than these omissions is the surprising error made by Dr. Giinther 

 himself, when he gravely states, that " no case is known of its (the 

 Echis) bite having proved fatal." At the present day this state- 

 ment can hardly need refutation. Even as far back as 1855-56, 

 Dr. Imlach, then Civil Surgeon of Shikarpur, in a description of 

 the ' Kapar' (Echis carinata), published in the Transactions of the 

 Bombay Medical and Physical Society (Vi<h Vol. III., New Series, 

 p 80), wrote that "a reference to police returns will show that in by 

 far the greatest majority of cases serious injury and death have been 

 caused by the bite of this species." The records of the Katnagiri 

 Civil Hospital for the last thirty years will tell a similar tale. But 

 even Sir Joseph Fayrer does not seem to have had sufficient infor- 

 mation on the subject to enable him to correct the error when he 

 wrote his Thanatophidia. He merely states that "it (Echis carinata) 

 is venomous, but Giinther says its bite is not known to have proved 

 fatal. This, I think, very doubtful. One in my possession killed a 

 fowl in four minutes, another in two minutes, and a dog in about 

 four hours." 



There is indeed no doubt that the Echis is afar more potent factor 

 than any other venomous species in swelling the mortality of the 

 Bombay Presidency, and it is important that this fact should be 

 more generally known and recognised than it has been hitherto. It 

 is, of course, impossible to show the exact percentage of the deaths 

 from snake-bite for which the Echis is responsible. In the returns 



