272 SNAKES. 



species of a different size, age, and colouring — a confusion 

 which frequently occurs with even more recent and more 

 scientific worthies than the good ' Pilgrim' Purchas. In a 

 later edition he says: * Other Serpents there are that carrie 

 vpon the Tippe of their Tayle a certaine little roundelle, 

 like a Bell, which ringeth as they goe.' 



Marcgrave, in his Travels in Brazil, 1648, further helps us 

 to label the right snake with the long vernaculars by figuring 

 a rattlesnake and calling it by the same name, only with an 

 additional syllable, Boiciiiiniuga, quein Cascavcl, the latter 

 euphonious Spanish word, for a little round bell, having 

 widely obtained ever since. 



As soon as the first English colony was settled in North 

 America, the rattlesnake again comes upon the stage. 

 Captain John Smith, whom we may call the founder of Virginia 

 (since it was owing to his good judgment, endurance, and 

 intelligence that the colony did not share the fate of Sir W. 

 Raleigh's adventurers), tells us of the ornaments worn by the 

 Indians, and the favour in which certain Rattells were held 

 by them as amulets. In his Gencrall Historic of Vi7'gi?iia, 

 162,2, Captain Smith describes their barbarous adornments, — 

 birds' claws, serpent skins, feathers with a ' rattell ' tied on to 

 them, which ' Rattells they take from the Taile of a Snake,' 

 and regard with superstitious veneration. 



With the spirit of enterprise which marked that era, and 

 the discovery of new countries and strange creatures, 

 'Natural History' began to be a recognised science in 

 Europe. Aldrovanus and Gesner had produced their 

 ponderous tomes, and the authors quoted by Purchas were 

 eagerly read by Ingenious Chirugions, who in England 



