CHAPTER XXIX. 



THE VENOMS AND THEIR REMEDIES, 



ON a subject which has baffled research in all ages, viz. 

 the endeavour to discover an antidote for snake 

 venom, it scarcely becomes me to speak. Yet, as in the 

 foregoing chapters, I may at least venture to lay before 

 my readers some general account of the various remedies used 

 in snake regions, and, for the benefit of residents in those 

 countries, describe the most approved means of treating 

 the bites of venomous serpents. Information of this kind 

 will not, I trust, be wholly useless. 



First, it may be as well to impressively repeat what has 

 been already constantly affirmed by all our scientific 

 experimentalists on snake venoms, that ' as yet no antidote to 

 them has been fonnd^ Remedies there are in abundance ; 

 and it is just as great an error to believe that all snake venom 

 is incurable — i.e. that a bitten person must necessarily die — 

 as that there are countless ' antidotes,' as persons broadly 

 and loosely call the various means of cure. 



At the time when Professor Halford's treatment by 



subcutaneous injections of ammonia were so popularly 



discussed, you might read week after week of ' Halford's 



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