ASCRIBED TO THE RATTLE SNAKE, S:c. 83 



1 think, 1 have fomewhcre either heard or read that 

 fhe tale was credited by the late Dr. Samuel Johnfon. 

 If i am miflaken, 1 hope the admirers of this great man, 

 fliould any of them read my memoir, will pardon me. 

 It is certain, notwithftanding the vaft flrength and the 

 rich fertility of Johnfon's mind, that he was credulous 

 and timid. Did this union of credulity and timidity arife 

 out of that unhappy melancholy (" thofc cafual eclipfes 

 which darken learning"), that often overclouded the 

 brightnefs of his mind*? We are told that the Hercules 

 of Englifh literature believed in ghofts, and in the fecond- 

 fight. The man who would thus fuffer his mind to be 

 eftranged from probability, and entangled in difficulties, 

 would, perhaps, find it eafy to bend to the beUef, that 

 ferpents have the faculty of fafcinating other animals. 



Although I profefs myfelf to be a warm admirer of 

 Linnxus, and although, at a very early period of my 

 life, I enlifted myfelf under the banner of his fchool, I 

 Ihall not, neverthelefs, attempt to conceal, that this great 

 man gave credit to the tale of the fafcination of birds and 

 other animals by ferpents. In his Syjlema 'Natures (that 

 immortal work), under the article Crotalus horridus, or 

 the rattle-fnake, he has the following words : " A'ves 

 Sciurof(jue ex arboribus in fauces revocat^^\ In another 

 work, he fpeaks as follows. " Whoever is wounded by 

 the Hooded Serpent {^Coluber Naja^ expires in a few 

 minutes ; nor can he efcape with life who is bitten by the 



* Or, did his melancholy grow out of his credulity and fear ? 



■]- See volume firll, p. 372. Vienna edition of 1767. Profeifor Gmelin, 

 in his edition of the Syllema Natitra, when fpeaking of the rattle-fnake, has 

 the following words, viz. " a-ves fiiurlque ex arboribus no?! raro in fauces in- 

 hiantis apertas ittciduni," torn. i. pars iii. p. 1080. The fame laborious 

 author Ipeaking of our grey-fquirrel (Sciurus cinereus) fays, " a crotalo 

 comeditur," tom. i. p. 147. This is true: but he might have faid the 

 fame when fpeaking of the flriped-dormoufe, or ground-fquirrel (Sciurus 

 llriatus), of our rabbit (Lepus americanus), and many other animals. 



Rattle-- 



