Zoology.-] NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. [Reptiles. 



In Tasmania this is popularl}' called " Carpet Snake," a name 

 ■oliicli properly belongs to the harmless snake so called on the 

 mainland. In this case, as with the H. superbiis, the Tasmanian 

 experunents on the treatment of bites fi-om this highly poisonous 

 species were unintelligible in Europe from the misuse of the estab- 

 lished popular name of a different and innocuous form. 



The greater number of cases of fatal snake-bites to men and 

 dogs near INIelbourue, and most of the experiments by Professor 

 Halford and others to test the power of the poison, and the efficacy 

 of the injection of ammonia into the blood, and other modes of 

 treatment, refer to this species, which is by far the most abundant 

 of all the dangerous snakes of the colony. In Dr. Halford's ex- 

 periments at the University of Melbourne, of 31 dogs bitten by 

 captive Tiger Snakes, 27 died and 4 recovered ; the deaths occurring, 

 on the average, in 2 hoiu'S 2 minutes. Deputy-Inspector- General 

 Macbeth, causing in India 29 dogs to be bitten by Cobras, found 

 they aU died, on the average, in 2 hours 42 minutes, showing that, 

 contraiy to the expressed opinion of many Indian practitioners, the 

 Australian Tiger Snake bite is more rapidly fatal than that of the 

 Cobra. Dr. McCrae, the Chief Medical Officer of Victoria, caused 

 14 dogs to be bitten by this species of snake, and none recovered. 

 No remedies were used in any of these three sets of cases. The 

 nimiber of deaths of human beings in the colony fi-om snake-bite in 

 the yeai' is very small ; but some of the cases given in the Austra- 

 lian Medical Journal for March 1875 are interesting from the bites 

 being publicly given in Melbourne, and the precise times noted both 

 of the bite and the death of the man. One, a police magistrate, 

 bitten on the arm by a Tiger Snake, died in 24 hours ; a man named 

 Undei'wood, a well-known vendor of a supposed antidote, was bitten 

 in public by one of this species, and was dead within an hour ; 

 another man named Cartwright, exhibiting some of these snakes, 

 was bitten and also died within an hour. Dr. Casey, of Brighton, 

 reported a case in which the man died within half an hour of the 

 bite ; and a man named Griffiths, handling some of these snakes 

 as an exhi1)ition at the Port Phillip Club Hotel, was bitten by a 

 Tiger Snake, and died in less than half an hour. The symptoms 

 seem to be much alike in all cases of snake-bite, viz. : — At first 



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