NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 209 



he will bring the mouth of the animal in contact with his forehead, 

 and draw it over his face. The ignorant vulgar believe that these 

 men really possess a charm, by which they thus play without 

 dread, and with impunity, with danger. The more enlightened, 

 laughing at this idea, consider the men impostors, and that in 

 playing their tricks there is no danger to be avoided, it being 

 removed by the extraction of their poison-fangs. The enlightened 

 in this instance are mistaken, and the vulgar are nearer the truth 

 in their opinion. I have examined the snakes I have seen exliibited, 

 and have found their poison-fangs in and uninjured. These men 

 do possess a charm, though not a supernatural one, \'iz., that of 

 confidence and courage : acquainted with the habits and disposition 

 of the snake, they know how averse it is to use the fatal weapon 

 nature has given it for its defence in extreme danger, and that it 

 never bites without much preparatory threatening. Any one 

 possessing the confidence and agility of these men may irritate 

 them, and I have made the trial more than once. They will play 

 their tricks with any hooded snake, whether just taken or long in 

 confinement, but with no other kind of poisonous snake. 



Captain Knox, in his History of Ceylon, observes 

 that the Cingalese have, in the ichneumon, a powerful 

 auxiliary against the multitude of snakes to which they 

 are exposed. Small as it is, it will, he says, venture to 

 attack even the cobra de capello, the poison of whose 

 bite is hardly equalled in danger by that of any other 

 serpent. Percival relates that one of these quadrupeds, 

 placed in a close room where a snake had been previously 

 introduced, instead of darting at it, ran peeping about the 

 apartment to discover some outlet through which it might 

 escape ; but, finding none, it returned to its master, crept 

 into his bosom, and could by no means be persuaded to 

 face the snake. When, however, both were removed out 

 of the house into an open space, the ichneumon instantly 

 flew at the reptile, and soon destroyed its antagonist. 

 After the victory the little quadruped suddenly dis- 

 appeared for a few minutes and again returned. Mr. 

 Percival concludes that during its absence it had found 

 the antidotal herb, and eaten of it ; but he does not state 

 the grounds for his conclusion. 



