336 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XVI11. 



again. The medical aspect of the case and treatment were fully 

 reported by me in the Indian Medical Record. (Nov. 1907.) 



This appears to be the only record of a case poisoned by this snake 

 if we except the instance recorded by Stoliczka * where a cooly was 

 wounded by a small specimen 14£ inches long. This case one may 

 infer was one of snakebite, not snake poisoning, since the man is 

 reported to have been dosed with alcohol, and continued marching 

 the rest of the day with no ill effects. 



Another cooly who brought me two specimens one morning told me 

 that he had just been bitten by one, and I saw a slight wound on his 

 right ankle from which blood was oozing, and the surrounding parts 

 were slightly swelled. He had placed a single cord rather tightly 

 above the wound, refused my proffered surgical attention, and showed 

 no apprehension, telling me the snake was a harmless one. A few 

 days later I saw him, and he said he had suffered very little in 

 consequence. The wound was healed, and he told me he had applied 

 ginger to it after infliction. 



I played with one large adult brought alive. I found its movements 

 in progression slow, but when it struck, the blow was delivered with 

 great alacrity. Teased with ordinary objects, a handkerchief, a 

 stick, &c, it showed supreme indifference, but when I suddenly 

 altered my position from an upright to a squatting one, although 

 at a safe distance, it struck out towards me with great malice and 

 celerity. This it repeated several times though it could not be provo- 

 ked to bite inanimate objects. My thoughts reverting to a passage 

 in Buckland's Work " Curiosities of Natural History" (p. 215) which 

 reads as follows: — " That the Arabs wore red buskins, and drawers, 

 with the evident purpose of exciting, and teasing the snakes, who 

 can't bear this colour near them, and as in the case of the common 

 viper always fly at it when brought into contact with them " — I 

 thought the present a good opportunity to test the accuracy of the 

 assertion. 



Accordingly after having teased it with many other agents, 1 

 brought my child's toy engine coloured vermilion into action. This 

 was advanced towards it at varying rates of speed, but although the 

 creature lay facing it, it neither retracted nor turned its head but 



* Jourl., Asiatic Soc, Becgal, Vol. XXXIX, pp. 224 to 226. 



