194 CENTRAL AMERICA. 



three months it ought to be shaken well two 

 or three times a-week, and the longer kept 

 the better. My friend had laid in a good 

 store, made of strong cognac twelve years 

 previously ; it had become a very strong in- 

 fusion, and had performed a number of cures : 

 he was not then aware how soon his remedy 

 was to be tested. Seeing one of the Indians 

 attached to his plantation idling about, he 

 told him to go and remove some loose timber 

 that was lying near an out-house, and put it 

 under shelter. The man came back in a few 

 minutes, looking more like a blue Indian 

 than a red one, and having only time to say 

 he had been stung, dropped down in a sort of 

 fit : my friend said it must have been done 

 by a snake ; but a bottle of this tincture was 

 quickly brought out, and about a wineglass- 

 full poured down his throat : he was then 

 laid on a bench and covered up with a 

 poncho, and in a few minutes he burst out 

 into a most profuse perspiration and fell 

 asleep. " All right," said my friend ; " he is 

 all right now." And several men having col- 

 lected, we started off to kill the snake that 

 was supposed to have bit him. On turning 

 over the piece of wood he had been raising, 

 we found, not a snake, but the largest and 



