BLACK VIPER. 687 
as to the effect of the bite of this Heterodon. Dr. Yarrow of Washington, 
D. C., called attention to it, and also since stated the fact that he had 
a fine specimen brought to him the past summer, which the slayer 
called the “‘ Mountain Moccasin,” and declared it to be the most venomous 
of all snakes. A similar belief prevails among the Indians and com- 
mon people generally. On the other hand, Messrs. H. S. Reynolds, 
Urbana, Illinois, C. C. Abbott, Trenton, New Jersey, and R. M. W. Gibbs, 
Kalamazoo, Michigan, state that they had each been bitten by 
Heterodon platyrhinus, and had known it to bite animals without serious 
results. Mr. H. E. Heighway, Cincinnati, Ohio, states that, while 
on a scientific expedition last summer, Prof. A.S. Wetherby and six 
students from Cincinnati University, found under old logs a “ Puffing 
Adder” of the genns Heterodon. The Professor picked it up fearlessly, and 
while preparing to put it into a bottle of alcohol, was bitten upon the 
thumb, but no attention was paid to the bite, and no harm resulted. On 
the other hand, it may be stated, that the Heterodon has at the posterior 
end of the maxillary bone two or four teeth, much larger than the 
others, and resembling fangs in appearance. They are still farther 
enveloped in a sheath similar to that in the venomous serpents, and 
separated by a short interval from the ordinary teeth. These teeth are 
firmly soldered to the bone, and not loosely set in grooves as the ordinary 
ones. That the animal could use them for the purpose of striking seemed 
to me impossible, until Prof. Steere informed me of their peculiar power 
of apparently dislocating their jaw, which may enable them to do so. 
The question therefore must be settled by observations made upon the 
actual bite of the animal. These thus far seem to point to its harmless 
character, and yet it is hardly safe from them to infer positively that 
the general opinion is wrong, and that naturalists are right. My own 
impression is that Heterodon is harmless, and yet its general appear- 
ance, and more especially the shape of its head strikingly resembles that 
of the venomous reptiles. 
HETERODON PLAYRHINUS Latreille. 
var. NIGER Catesby. 
Biack Viper. 
Vipera nigra, CATESBY. 
Coluber cacodemon, SHAW. 
Scytale niger, DAUDIN, HARLAN. 
Coluber thraso, HARLAN. 
Heterodon niger, TRoosT, HOLBROOK, KIRTLAND, BarRD and GIRARD, DUMERIL and 
BIBRON, GUNTHER, 
