GARDEN OF SERPENTS—POZZI. 443 
The pathological physiology of venom poisoning has become very 
well known through the researches of Calmette and V. Brazil. The 
poisoning resulting from the bite of a Bothrops is hemorrhagicin nature. 
After a bite there occurs a decomposition of the blood which escapes 
from the capillaries, causing profuse hemorrhage in the subcutaneous 
and submucous tissues, accompanied by acute congestion of the liver, 
kidneys, and brain. It is a sort of acute purpura. The Crotalus 
venom, on the contrary, is a paralyzing poison. It produces bulbar 
paralysis with disturbances of the respiration, the vision, and the 
circulation. Local reaction at the seat of the wound is absent or 
extremely slight. Death of the victim, if a man, results after a vari- 
able time, generally about 24 hours. 
Vital Brazil has made elaborate studies of the effects of venoms 
upon animals. The poison of the Crotalus terrificus kills a pigeon 
when one one-thousandth of a milligram is injected into its veins. 
The fatal doses for other venoms vary slightly. 
I will now describe in a few words the preparation of the antivenom 
serum at Butantan. 
The serum prepared at Lille by Dr. Calmette has little efficacy in 
Brazil. Indeed, he himself says in his remarkable book, Upon 
Venoms, “For each venom there is a corresponding serum.’ Since 
the serum of the institution at Lille is almost wholly prepared with 
the venom of Asiatic snakes, although excellent for counteracting 
the bites of Huropean vipers, it is useless against the bites of the 
Brazilian Bothrops or Crotalus. Accordingly Dr. Vital Brazil has 
prepared two specific serums, one anticrotalic, the other antibothropic, 
each having, in small doses, a particular efficacy against the bites 
of the corresponding snakes. But as it is rare that the kind of snake 
producing a bite is known, it was important to have also a polyvalent 
serum, that is one equally active against all venoms. Such a serum 
Dr. Brazil has made. 
The animal used to furnish the antitoxic serum is the horse. A 
young and healthy animal is taken, free from any disease, and 
particularly from glanders. Horses are very sensitive to the venom 
from snakes. At first a minimum does is injected, five one-hundreths 
of a milligram; then the does is increased. The injections are 
repeated every five or six days; as soon as the animal seems to 
suffer or to lose weight the injections are stopped. It is a curious 
fact that as soon as the immunization is complete the animal seems 
to thrive from the absorption of the poison; it grows fat, its weight 
increases. And yet further, a horse in the process of immunization, 
if the injections are stopped, pines away somewhat as does a morphio- 
maniac when the latter is deprived of his habitual poison. The 
horse has become, in fact, a seromaniac. 
