POISON OF SOME INDIAN VENOMOUS SNAKES. 7 



If the third, what chance have we beyond that of sustaining 

 life as long as artificial respiration be maintained ? for if the 

 nerve-apparatus be permanently injured, no resumption of its 

 functions can take place. Whichever of these propositions be 

 nearest the truth, there must still be a condition in which 

 from the smallness of the quantity of virus inoculated, recovery 

 is possible— one in which the full lethal effect of the virus is 

 not produced. In such cases, no doubt, remedial measures 

 may be of avail. 



The results of investigations in India have led to the con- 

 clusion, then, that death is brought about by the action of the 

 poison on the cerebro-spinal nerve-centres, paralysing them, 

 and in some cases, where the quantity of virus VN^as large and 

 introduced into the circulation through the medium of a large 

 vein, acting directly on the ganglia of the heart, causing arrest 

 of its action. In those cases where the quantity of virus 

 inoculated is smaller and of less intensity, according to th-e 

 condition of the snake or its species (the poison of some genera 

 being less active than that of others), secondary changes, 

 though of what precise kind we are not yet prepared to say, 

 occur in the blood itself, but allied in character to that of other 

 blood-poisons and probably of a zymotic nature. We would* 

 merely for the present remark that, in the first class of cases, 

 we believe that remedies or means of treatment other than 

 those which may be of a preventive character are as yet of no 

 avail, whilst in the second it is probable that they may be of 

 some efficacy. So far we believe little more has been done 

 than to go over ground that has already been traversed by 

 previous observers, who have come to similar conclusions that 

 most of the reputed antidotes have been powerless, and that 

 where there has been an appearance of success, it has depended 

 not on any antidotal or antagonistic action of the remedy so 

 much as on the fact that the quantity or quality of the poison 

 was defective ; and how this may be explained, Dr. Fayrer has 

 endeavoured to prove by showing that the snake may have been 

 exhausted, that its poison may be deficient in quantity or in 

 quality, or that it may have wounded without inoculating 

 sufficient of the poison to cause death, or more than to cause 



