396 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1S03. 



After all, is not the objeetion wliicli some authors make to the power 

 of ''charming" or ''lascinatiiij;" more directed against the use of these 

 words themselves than against thei)henomeuon which they are intended 

 'to describe? 



The possibility, already ex])ressed by Kalm, that the victims might be 

 overcome by a special fetid smell, said to be emitted by the snake, does 

 not seem to have any foundation in fact, much less the more fanciful 

 suggestion by more "popular'' writers that the cause is a poisonous 

 quality of the snake's breath. It is true that there are situated some 

 glands about the vent which eject a fluid of a penetrating odor, if the 

 snakes are handled roughly, but it is a common observation that the 

 crotalids under ordinary circumstances issue no jjeculiar odor. Dr. 

 Mitchell states that the fluid referred to is of a yellow or dark brown 

 color; that it niiiy be ejected to a distance of 2 or 3 feet, and that it is 

 irritant when it enters the eye, although not otherwise injurious. I am 

 not aware that these glands and their secretion in the pit vipers have 

 been studied in detail. 



Occasionally we hear of the finding of large numbers of Eattlesnakes 

 or copperheads in caves in rocks brought to light by blasting for a rail- 

 road or a quarry. We are also all familiar with the periodically 

 recurring story, now at least 200 years old, however, of the man who 

 built his log cabin against the side of the mountain in such a manner 

 that the perpendicular face of the rock formed the back wall of the 

 hut, and who with his family had to spend the first night among the 

 rafters because the heat from the fire had thawed out the inhabitants 

 of a vast rattlesnake "den" somewhere in the rock, the noisy serpents 

 coming out by tlie hundreds and taking possession of the floor and 

 the beds. We have also heard the more modern and improved edition 

 of this story, apparently due to the vivid imagination of western 

 journalists a'-cordmg to which the Kansas farmer erected the same log 

 cabin in the same i)osition — not for himself, however, but for his son, who 

 intended to spend his honeymoon in it, and who, with his young bride, 

 was found the morning after the wedding, killed and partly eaten by an 

 army ot the loathsome reptiles. It would fill an entire volume were I to 

 mention all the gruesome snake stories that are served up by an enter- 

 prising press with an ever increasing amount of high seasoning to 

 satisfy the cravings of a public now habitually fed on sensations. 

 Stripped of all the lurid word painting, of all the epithets suggesting 

 sliminess and other qualities not belonging to any snakes, and of all 

 exaggerations as to numbers, stench, and noise, there lies at the bottom 

 the truth that these poisonous snakes, like many others of the harmless 

 kind, in winter often congregate in great numbers in some cavity in the 

 ground or among rocks. In these retreats they spend the cold season 

 in a state of more or less deep stupor, or lethargy, until warm weather 

 comes to (juicken their pulses, when they issue from their winter 



