Our Natural Enemies. 197 



feeling of hatred against them, an instinctive and unappeas- 

 able enmity, is perfectly natural, and has grown out of relig- 

 ious superstitions. Fear, disgust and aversion are man's 

 experiences at the sight of a snake, and there is at once a 

 disposition to seize a stick or stone, or to make use of his 

 heel, if well protected, to deal a fatal stroke. War to the 

 death seems to be the cry between the highest of the 

 mammals and the serpent tribe. It is not at all surprising, 

 therefore, that the snake, seeing a human enemy, should 

 either glide hastily off into the bushes, or, being thwarted, 

 should coil itself r.p and hiss or throw itself forward in 

 attack. Man would do well to protect the snakes about 'his 

 domains, and treat them as friends, for they do him invalu- 

 able service in the destruction of vermin that make havoc 

 with his crops. 



Ants, bees, spiders, and many fishes, animals that are lower 

 down in the scale than the snake, it is claimed, show far more 

 forecast, ingenuity and architectural ability than it, but asserters 

 of such an opinion forget that the snake is never studied under 

 favorable conditions. Long ages of persecution have made 

 him fearful of man, from whose presence he flees as from a 

 pestilence or scourge, and there is consequently no chance 

 to learn his better nature. Even man, until recently, has 

 shown no inclination to make his acquaintance, being con- 

 trolled by a dread which it appears well nigh impossible to 

 overcome. Where the animal has been made to partake of 

 the milk of human kindness, and has learned to regard man 

 as a friend and not an enemy, he has shown remarkable sus- 

 ceptibility to culture and enlightenment. Let it be hoped 

 that a modicum of the wisdom which has been attributed to 

 him from the earliest of times, when he was made the object 

 of homage and the insignia of the physician, shall at least be 

 found to remain to the credit of science and truth. 



