THE VENOMS AND THEIR REMEDIES. 541 



years (i 860-1 871 Inclusive) only four British soldiers died 

 from snake-bite, thirty-eight died from the bite of mad 

 dogs ; and he thinks it would be more beneficial to the 

 community to kill off some of the hordes of these dangerous 

 animals which infest the country during the summer months. 

 Moreover, that * in comparison with preventible diseases and 

 a percentage of the entire population, snake-bites are sensa- 

 tional trifles! He thinks the savage crusade against snakes 

 worse than useless, and argues that it would be better to seek 

 remedies for diseases that harm more Europeans in a week 

 than snakes do in a century. Others tell us that the number 

 of deaths is greatly exaggerated, and that many by violence 

 or through fatalism and barbarities are set down to snakes. 



But to return to remedies, one would suppose that drugs 

 or plants which kill venomous snakes would be also cures for 

 their bites. It is an old belief that vipers contain in them- 

 selves an 'antidote' to their venom, and hence the number of 

 popular medicines prepared from their bodies. Conversely, 

 some of the deadly poisons of the pharmacopeia are death 

 to snakes. Aristolochia produces powerful effects on the 

 African vipers ; the white ash {Fraxinins Aniericanns) is an 

 equally rapid poison to the rattlesnake, as Prof Silliman 

 proved. It is said that these reptiles are never found in the 

 vicinity of this tree. It was the white ash which Oliver 

 Wendell Holmes introduced into his story of * Elsie Venner/ 

 as being destructive to crotalus life, and the novelist wrote 

 from his experience of its effects. Similar cases have been 

 recorded in the Philosophical Transactions. Pennyroyal, says 

 Charas, was held to the nose of a viper, 'who by turning and 

 wriggling laboured hard to avoid it ; and in half an hour's 



