COMMON VIPER. 63 



symptoms arc frequently so threatening', that I cannot but 

 conclude that in very hot weather, and when not only 

 the reptile is in full activity and power, but the constitu- 

 tion of the victim in a state of great irritability and dimi- 

 nished power, a bite from the Common Viper would very 

 probably prove fatal. The remedies usually employed are 

 the external application of oil, and the internal adminis- 

 tration of ammonia. 



The poisonous fluid is perfectly innocuous when swal- 

 lowed. Dr. Mead, and others, have made this experiment, 

 and never experienced the slightest ill effects from it. It 

 is, however, clear that there would be danger in swallow- 

 ing it, were any part of the mouth, the throat, or the 

 oesophagus, in a state of ulceration, or having an abraded 

 surface. 



It will not perhaps be wholly uninteresting to describe 

 briefly the very beautiful apparatus* by which the poison 

 wounds are inflicted, which render these, and so many 

 other Serpents, so formidable. On each side of the ujjper 

 jaw, instead of the outer row of teeth which are found in 

 non- venomous Serpents, there exist two or three, or more, 

 long, curved, and tubular teeth, the first of which is larger 

 than the others, and is attached to a small moveable bone, 

 articulated to the maxillary bone, and moved by a mus- 

 cular apparatus, by which the animal has the £>ower of 

 erecting it. In a state of rest the fang reclines backwards 

 along the margin of the jaw, and is covered by a fold of 

 skin ; but when about to be called into use, it is erected 

 by means of a small muscle, and brought to stand perpen- 

 dicular to the bone. The tooth itself is as it were perfo- 

 rated by a tube, the mode of formation of which was not 

 understood until it was demonstrated by Mr. Smith in the 



* See page 64. 



