38 The Poets and Nature. 



them with terrors equal to any creature of fable, and with 

 the superstitious, might entitle them to divide honours with 

 the past objects of Ammonian worship and be the central 

 figures in the rites of Thermuthis or of Ops." 



Very few specific varieties of the ophidian class find 

 notice in verse. Apostrophising the Red Man whom Mrs. 

 Hemans, by the way, calls " a snake" Eliza Cook bids 

 him go and consort with " the whipsnake and the jaguar," a 

 task which is as cruelly severe as any ever set by the wicked 

 stepmothers of the fairy tales, for, to consort simultaneously 

 with both whipsnake and jaguar would necessitate the 

 Red Man's being in two places at once, seeing that those 

 creatures inhabit different continents. 



The " rattlesnake "the " Indian's rattlesnake "of Butler- 

 meets with frequent reference. Byron has these mysterious 



lines : 



"Sprung from a race whose rising blood, 

 When stirred beyond its calmer mood 

 And trodden hard upon, is like 

 The rattlesnake's in act to strike." 



" Like a live arrow leapt the rattlesnake," says Mont- 

 gomery; but Goldsmith's line, "The rattling terrors of the 

 vengeful snake, " is perhaps the best, though Butler is 

 certainly more truthful to nature when he says 



" One that idly rails and threats, 

 And all the mischief that he meant 

 Does, like a rattlesnake, prevent." 



For this snake's alarum is, I think, from the personal experi- 

 ences of the reptile already narrated, a merciful provision 

 for the security of man and beast, rather than any additional 

 circumstance of malignity in the reptile. But for that warn- 

 ing sound I should myself have often come very near to 

 treading on them, and on one occasion actually touching 

 one with my hand ; but the smallest alarm makes the hidden 

 thing declare itself. The noisy gift, in fact, is fatal to the 

 snake, and the salvation of everything else. 



