496 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Mr. Simson says that lie had an elepliant-driver, or mahout, 

 who was a great snake-catcher and very reckless. He writes thus : 

 " I never saw him press down the snake with a rod such as I have 

 described, but he caught numbers of snakes of all sorts, and sent 

 them alive to his house. His movements were so rapid, and gen- 

 erally in jungle and with his back to me, that I never made out 

 exactly why he did not get bit. He used to jump off his elephant, 

 leaving the animal in my guidance ; in a moment afterward he 

 had the snake's neck in his hand. He said that he caught them 

 by their tails, swung them under his arm, and held them there, 

 while he slipped his hand up to the back of the head. He then 

 gave the snake some of his clothing to amuse himself with, and 

 on which to expend its venom. He then wrapped the reptiles up 

 in a loose cloth and took very little trouble with them. I have 

 seen him catch snakes scores of times, but I rather discouraged 

 him, as I did not like the idea of having live venomoiis snakes at 

 large, or even in earthen pots or boxes. At the same time he re- 

 ceived good prices for his snakes." 



Some people who are used to handle snakes seem to lose all 

 feeling of apprehension regarding them. Sir Joseph Fayrer, 

 whose work styled " Thanatophidia " contains the most perfect 

 colored plates and descriptions of the principal venomous snakes, 

 had no fear of them. But he was very nearly bitten one day. He 

 and a friend were busy examining the peculiar anatomy of a por- 

 tion of a cobra's tail. The cobra was in a box, and a native assistant 

 was supposed to be holding down the lid of the box so as to allow 

 only the tail to protrude. Somehow the native became careless, 

 and he relaxed his hold on the lid, so that the cobra suddenly put 

 out its head to see what Sir Joseph Fayrer was doing with its tail. 

 Luckily it was more pleased than offended at the liberties which 

 were being taken with its tail, but it was unpleasant for Sir Jo- 

 seph Fayrer to find his face almost touching the cobra's mouth. 

 Dr. Richards was another officer who assisted Sir Joseph Fayrer 

 in his experiments with snakes. Dr. Richards came one day to 

 see a lady patient at my house. He arrived in a palanquin which 

 was put down in the portico. He went to the lady's room and 

 paid her a brief visit ; and when he came out of the room he went 

 to the palanquin and brought out a large cobra which he had 

 brought over to show me, in order to prove by experiments in my 

 presence that a particular kind of wood, which a native fakir de- 

 clared to be an antidote to snake-poison, was of no value. It is 

 unnecessary to recapitulate the experiments, but his familiarity 

 with the deadly snake was quite alarming. I could not help won- 

 dering what his lady patient would have said if she had known 

 that he had brought a snake with him to the house, for she was 

 terribly nervous about snakes. 



