Mr Audubon's Notes on Rattlesnake. Ti 



iy bit through the boot by a rattlesnake, as he was walking to 

 view his ripening corn fields, that the pain felt was thought by 

 him to have been from the scratch of a thorn, not having seen or 

 heard the reptile : upon his return home, he felt, on a sudden, vio- 

 lently sick at stomach, vomited with great pain, and died in a 

 few hours. Twelve months after this, the eldest son who had 

 taken his father's boots, put them on and went to church at 

 some distance. On his going to bed that night, whilst drawing 

 off his boots, he felt slightly scratched on the leg, but merely men- 

 tioned it to his wife, and rubbed the place with his hand. In a 

 few hours, however, he was awakened by violent pains, com- 

 plained of general giddiness, fainted frequently, and expired be- 

 fore any succour could be applied with success ; the cause of his 

 illness also being quite a mystery. In course of time his effectswere 

 sold, and a second brother, through filial affection, purchased the 

 boots, and, if I remember rightly, put them on about two years 

 after. As he drew them off, he felt a scratch and complained of 

 it, when the widowed sister being present, recollected that the 

 same pain had been felt by her husband on the like occasion : 

 the youth went to bed, suffered and died in the same way that 

 his father and brother had before him. These repeated and 

 singular deaths being rumoured in the country, a medical gentle- 

 man called upon the friends of the deceased to inquire into the 

 particulars, and at once pronounced their deaths to have been oc- 

 casioned by venom. The boots that had been the cause of com- 

 plaint were brought to him, when he cut one of them open with 

 care, and discovered the extreme point of the fang of a rattle- 

 snake issuing from the leather, and assured the people that this 

 had done all the mischief. To prove this satisfactorily, he scratch- 

 ed with it the nose of a dog, and the dog died in a few hours 

 from the poisonous effect it was still able to convey. 



In confirmation of these facts, I have been told by native 

 Americans, that arrows dipt in rattlesnake venom, would carry 

 death for ages after. 



Some European writers of great eminence have asserted, that 

 rattlesnakes are destroyed by hogs in such quantities, that the 

 introduction of the latter into any country, would soon clear it 

 of the former. In the United States, where hogs are very nu- 

 merous, I never witnessed any one attempt to kill a rattlesnake, 



