OF THE VENOM OF THE RATTLESNAKE. 63 



diffluent, presenting but a single small coagulum of loose structure. The intestines 

 were spotted with ecchymoscs, and the peritoneal cavity contained about a drachm 

 of fluid blood. 



I may add to these cases the numerous instances in which I have wounded the 

 mouths of snakes, or torn the vagina dentis, while robbing them of poison. On 

 none of these occasions has any serious result followed the injury, even where 

 venom had fallen upon the abraded surfaces in considerable amount. 



The above experiments were on the whole so definite in their results, that I did 

 not think it necessary to multiply them. I had very many times injured snakes 

 far more than these were injured by their own fangs, or the preparatory manipula- 

 tions, and I, therefore, felt at liberty to conclude that the animals employed on these 

 latter occasions really died from the venom. The length of time required for this 

 to occur was curious, and for exceeded in most of them that which was noted in 

 Bernard's case, or in the many instances of which I have been told where rattle- 

 snakes had stricken themselves. 



One of the factors in the experiment, and one which has been too much neg- 

 lected, is the temperature, which in my own cases was very moderate during the 

 day, and fell a good deal lower at night, the observations having been carried on 

 during a cool period in September, 1859. M. Bernard, Russell, and Fontana, give 

 no record of the temperature during their observations. That it is a very important 

 condition in the venom poisoning of the cold-blooded batrachia I have frequently 

 observed, and it is highly probable that in all cold-blooded animals the elevation 

 of temperature carries with it an increase of danger from poisons, and especially 

 from those of a septic nature. 



When we examine the pathological effects of the venom in warm-blooded ani- 

 mals, we shall see that, while the general phenomena were essentially the same 

 as in cold-blooded reptiles and batrachia, they were far more rapidly produced. 

 The Crotalus itself was a good illustration of this contrast, and was in other 

 respects exceptional in the mode in which it was affected, since, while the muscles 

 were altered, as in warm-blooded creatures, the blood coagulated better than was 

 usual in them, and the visceral lesions were less severe, and less frequent. On the 

 other hand, while the frog was for its size remarkably unirapressible by Crotalus 

 venom, the phenomena which in it accompanied the examples of slow poisoning, 

 were in no respect different from those developed in the warm-blooded animals. 

 To this subject we shall recur, after studying the effects of the venom upon the 

 hiffher animals. 



