vi. INTliODlJCTION TO FBENCH EDITION 



taking up a study which appeared to possess considerable 

 interest on the morrow of the discoveries of E. Roux and 

 Behring, w4th reference to the toxins of diphtheria and 

 tetanus, and I could not allow the chance to escape. For 

 the last fifteen years I have been occupied continuously 

 with this subject, and I have published, or caused to be 

 published by my students, in French, English, or German 

 scientific journals, a fairly large number of memoirs either 

 on venoms and the divers venomous animals, or on anti- 

 venomous serum-therapeutics. The collation ' of these 

 papers is now becoming a matter of some difficulty, and it 

 appeared to me that the time had arrived for the production 

 of a monograph, which ma}^, I hope, be of some service to 

 all who are engaged in biological research. 



Antivenomo'us seruni-tlierapij, which my studies, sup- 

 plemented by those of Phisalix and Bertrand, Eraser, 

 George Lamb, F. Tidswell, McFarland, and Vital Brazil, 

 have enabled me to establish upon scientific bases, has 

 now entered into current medical practice. In each of the 

 countries in which venomous bites represent an important 

 cause of mortality in the case of human beings and domestic 

 animals, special laboratories have been officially organised 

 for the preparation of anti-venomous serum. All that 

 remains to be done is to teach its use to those who are 

 ignorant of it, especially to the indigenous inhabitants of 

 tropical countries, where snakes are more especially formid- 

 able and deadly. This book will not reach such people as 

 these, but the medical men, naturalists, travellers, and 

 explorers to whom it is addressed will know how to popu- 

 larise and apply the information that it will give them. 



