416 



HISTORY OF FROGS, LIZARDS, AND SERPENTS. 



their hideous deity, but also their wives and 

 daughters. These the priests readily accept 

 of, and after some days of penance, return 

 them to their suppliants, much benefited by 

 the serpent's supposed embraces. Such a 

 complicated picture of ignorance and imposture 

 gives no very favourable impressions of our 

 fellow-creatures; but \ve may say, in defence 

 of human nature, that the most frightful of 

 reptiles is worshipped by the most uncultivated 

 and barbarous of mankind. 



From this general picture of the serpent 

 tribe, one great distinction obviously presents 

 itself ; namely, into those that are venomous, 

 and those that are wholly destitute of poison. 

 To the first belong the viper, the rattle-snake, 

 the cobra di capello, and all their affinities ; 

 to the other, the common black snake, the 

 liboya, the boiguacu, the amphisbaena, and 

 various others, that, though destitute of venom, 

 do not cease to be formidable. I will, there- 

 fore, give their history separately, beginning 

 with the venomous class, as they have the 

 strongest claims to our notice and attention. 



CHAP. II. 



OF VENOMOUS SERPENTS IN GENERAL. 



THE poison of serpents has been for ages 

 one of the greatest objects of human considera- 

 tion. To us, who seldom feel the vengeful 

 wound, it is merely a subject of curiosity ; but 

 to those placed in the midst of the serpent 

 tribe, who are every day exposed to some new 

 disaster, it becomes a matter of the most serious 

 importance. To remedy the bite of a serpent 

 is considered, among our physicians, as one 

 of the slightest operations in medicine : but 

 among the physicians of the East, the antidotes 

 for this calamity make up the bulk of their 

 dispensaries. In our colder climates, the 

 venom does not appear with that instantaneous 

 operation which it exhibits in the warmer 

 regions ; for either its powers are less exquisite, 

 or our fluids are not carried round in such 

 rapid circulation. 



In all countries, however, the poison of the 

 serpent is sufficiently formidable to deserve 

 notice, and to excite our attention to its nature 

 and effects. It will, therefore, in the firs! 

 place, be proper to describe its seat in the ani- 

 mal, as also the instrument by which the 

 wound is made, and the poison injected. In 

 all this venomous class of reptiles, whether 

 the viper, the rattle-snake, or the cobra di 

 capello, there are two large teeth or fang 

 that issue from the upper jaw, and that hang 

 out beyond the lower. The rest of the snake 

 tribe are destitute of these ; and it is most 



probable that wherever these fangs are want- 

 ng, the animal "is harmless ; on the contrary, 

 wherever they are found it is to be avoided as 

 he most pestilent enemy. These are the 

 nstruments that seem to place the true dis- 

 inction between animals of the serpent kind ; 

 he wounds which these fangs inflict produce 

 he most dangerous symptoms ; the wounds 

 nflicted by the teeth only are attended with 

 nothing more than the ordinary consequences 

 ttending the bite of any other animal. Our 

 irst great attention, therefore, upon seeing a 

 serpent, should be directed to the teeth. If 

 it has the fang teeth, it is to be placed among 

 :he venomous class ; if it wants them, it may 

 oe set down as inoffensive. I am not igno- 

 rant that many serpents are said to be danger- 

 ous whose jaws are unfurnished with fangs ; 

 but it is most probable that our terrors only 

 have furnished these animals with venom ; for 

 of all the tribe whose teeth are thus formed, 

 not one will be found to have a bag for con- 

 taining poison, nor a conduit for injecting it 

 into the wound. The Black Snake, the 

 Liboya, the Blind Worm, and a hundred 

 others that might be mentioned, have their 

 teeth of an equal size, fixed into the jaws, and 

 with no other apparatus for inflicting a danger- 

 ous wound than a dog or a lizard : but it is 

 otherwise with the venomous tribe we are now- 

 describing- ; these are well furnished, not onl} 

 with an elaboratory where the poison is formed, 

 but a canal by which it is conducted to the 

 jaw, a bag under the tooth for keeping it 

 ready for every occasion, and also an aperture 

 in the tooth itself for injecting it into the 

 wound. To be more particular : the glands 

 that serve to fabricate this venomous fluid are 

 situated on each side of the head behind the 

 eyes, and have their canals leading from thence 

 to the bottom of the fangs in the upper jaw, 

 where they enter into a kind of bladder, from 

 whence the fangs on each side are seen to grow. 

 The venom contained in this bladder is a 

 yellowish thick tasteless liquor, which injected 

 into the blood is death, yet which may be 

 swallowed without any danger. 



The fangs that give the wound come next 

 under observation ; they are large in propor- 

 tion to the size of the animal that bears them ; 

 crooked, yet sharp enough to inflict a ready 

 wound. They grow one on each side, and 

 sometimes two, from two movable bones in 

 the upper jaw, which by sliding backward or 

 forward, have a power of erecting or depress- 

 ing the teeth at pleasure. In these bones are 

 also fixed many teeth, but no way venomous, 

 and only serving to take and hold the animal's 

 prey. Besides this apt disposition of the 

 fangs, they are hollow within and have an 

 opening towards the point, like the slit of a 

 pen, through which, when the fang is pressed 



