218 LEAVES FROM THE 



The symptoms which follow the bite of a viper, when it fastens 

 either one or both its greater teeth in any part of the body, are an 

 acute pain in the place wounded, with a swelling, at first red, but 

 afterwards livid, which by degrees spreads further to the neigh- 

 bouring i^arts ; with great faintness, and a quick though low and 

 sometimes interrupted pulse, great sickness at the stomach, with 

 bilious convulsive vomitings, cold sweats, and sometimes pains 

 about the navel ; and if the cure be not speedy, death itself, unless 

 the strength of nature prove sufficient to overcome these disorders ; 

 and though it does, the swelHng still continues inflamed for some 

 time ; nay, in some cases more considerably upon the abating of 

 the other symptoms, than at the beginning. And often from 

 the small w^ound runs a sanious liquor, and little pustules are 

 raised about it : the colour of the whole skin, in less than an hour, 

 is changed yellow, as if the patient had the jaundice.* 



The rapidity with which animal life may be overcome 

 by the poison of venomous snakes is well illustrated by 

 Mr. Bell, the present secretary of the Royal Society; 

 and, by the way, in one of his dissections he had proof 

 of the danger which may be incurred in investigating 

 their anatomy. 



The head of a large rattlesnake had been taken off 

 immediately after death. Some hours afterwards Mr. 

 Bel] was carefully dissecting the poison-apparatus ; but 

 though so long a time had elapsed since the head was 

 cut away, Mr. Bell found that the poison continued to be 

 secreted so fast as to require the occasional use of a piece 

 of rag or sponge ; and he remarks that there could not 

 have been altogether less than six or eight drops of the 

 deadly fluid distilled from the gland in the severed head. 



As might be expected, if a succession of wounds be 

 given by a poisonous snake, the creature last stricken 

 has the best chance of recovery. One of Mr. Bell's 

 friends had received a rattlesnake from America, and 

 upon the principle contained in the apophthegm, Fiat 

 experimentum in cor^oore vili, a pack of wretched rats 



* Mead on Poisons. 



