464 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1893. 



<}xert such an intiueiice upon the veiioni as to make them available as 

 local antidotes. We emphasize local, because from the very nature of 

 the poison as an albuminoid and consequently chemically closely related 

 to normal constituents of the blood, there can be no chemical antidote 

 which after the introduction of the venom into the circulation would 

 be able to destroy the poison without also destroying the blood itself. 



1 wish to call attention here to the fact that Mitchell repeatedly 

 makes distinction between the poisoning- resulting- in death within a 

 few hours and when it is slower in coming. He found that in the most 

 rapid poisoning there is frequently nothing appreciable to the naked 

 eye beyond the slight local lesion, or here and there minute capillary 

 hemorrhages, when death has b(^en delayed beyond a minute ; while in 

 examples of chronic poisoning, both the local and the systemic changes 

 are enormously more extensive. This distinction between local and 

 systemic changes is one of considerable importance, since the rational 

 treatment of any given case hinges upon the full understanding of this 

 point. 



Only two years pass, and another very important contribution to our 

 knowledge of the intricate question of snake poison was published, 

 this time by a Russian, Dr. E. A. Feoktistow, the same whose work on 

 the rattle of the rattlesnake we have already had the occasion to quote 

 In 1888 he issued a doctor dissertation with the following title: Expe- 

 rimentelle Untersuchungen iiber Schlangengift,* based upon about 400 

 exj^eriments with the fresh venom from about 200 specimens belonging 

 to several species of vipers and Crotalus dnri.sstis. His researches 

 cover to a great extent those of Mitchell and Reichert. In some cases 

 the disagreement between the results of these eminent students is 

 highly perplexing; for instance, in regard to the effect of the venom 

 upon the blood and the blood vessels. The disagreement as to the 

 causes of death as formulated by Mitchell and Reichert, on one hand, 

 and Feoktistow on the other, also seems startling at iirst, for the former 

 conclude that death occurs through paralysis of the respiratory cen- 

 ters, jDaralysis of the heart, hemorrhages in the medulla, or possibly 

 through the inability of the profoundly altered red corpuscles to per- 

 form their functions, and they positively assert that the direct action 

 of the venom upon the nervous system, save as concerns the paralysis 

 of the respiratory centers, is of but little importance, while Feoktistow 

 with equal positiveness concludes that the siuike venom is a nerve 

 poison par excellence, which paralyzes the vasomotor center, and in 

 large doses. the respiratory center as well. It is impossible for us here 

 to carry out a comparative analysis of the two works, but I think it 

 will be found that the disagreement between these authors is more 

 ;il)l)arent than real, and that it consists more in the interpretation of 



* St. Petersburg, 8vo., 47 pp. ; a preliminary article in Meui Ac. Sc. St.-Petersb. 

 (7«, ser.) XXXVI, No. 4, 22 pp., under title: Eine Vorliiufige Mittheilung iiber die 

 Wirkuuff des Schlaniireuiiiftcs anf den tbieriscben Orsranismus. 



