334 VENOMS 
XIII. —Case reported by Dr. Deschamps, of Thiès (Senegal). 
‘ In the month of October, 1898, I was called to a native, a 
local constable, who had just been bitten by a Naja. The Ouoloffs 
of Senegal are much afraid of the bites of this reptile, since they 
are generally fatal. In this case the man had been bitten in the 
forehead by a snake, which was coiled up in his bed, as he was 
placing his head on the pillow. Being in the dark, he got up 
greatly frightened, lit a candle, and saw the snake glide from his 
bed and escape through the half-open door. I arrived a few 
minutes after the accident; the constable already felt very weak, 
and complained of nausea and of pains in the head and back of 
the neck. In the middle region of the forehead I found two 
adjacent wounds, around which the tissues were cedematous. I 
washed the wounds with a solution of permanganate of potash, 
and had a telegram sent to St. Louis asking for antivenomous 
serum. Half an hour after the bite, the patient was seized with 
vomiting and cold sweats. At 6 a.m. on the following day there 
was considerable cedema of the face and dyspnoea, while the pulse 
was small and intermittent. The patient, who had not slept, was 
dull and depressed. He vomited a little milk which I tried to 
make him take. Forty hours after the bite the patient, who 
was already paralysed, became comatose; the face and neck were 
enormously swollen. The dyspnoea had increased ; it was difficult 
to hear the respiratory murmur; the pulse was thready, slow, and 
intermittent; the skin was cold; the temperature, taken in the 
axilla, was 35°8° C. At this moment the serum asked for arrived 
from St. Louis. I injected into the buttock the only dose that 
I possessed, 10 c.c. The coma persisted throughout the evening 
and during part of the night; at 6 am. on the following day, 
fourteen hours after the injection, the patient awoke and said 
that he felt quite well. The oedema of the face and neck had 
diminished, that of the eyelids had disappeared. Three days 
later the constable returned to duty.” 
XIV.—Case reported by Professors H. P. Keatenje and A. 
Ruffer (Cairo). 
