Snakes in Nature. 53 



Are more wanted ? Then take bramble leaves or herb- 

 william, bugloss, horehound, betony, hawk-weed, or a cross 

 made of hazel twigs. Indeed, bugloss and dittany will not 

 only cure the bitten but kill the biter all of which is very 

 curious and pathetically human, seeing that these weeds are 

 but common wayside wildings, and not some upas or man- 

 chineel or dreadful Chilian serpent-tree. That these should 

 chill the fiery, blood-kindling venom of snakes we could 

 almost be content to imagine. Their own juices are too 

 fatal for serpents' rivalry. 



It is easy, therefore, to see how these reptiles came to 

 possess the reputation of being cunning in herbs, and so, 

 illogically (after the manner of popular beliefs), of being 

 themselves medicinal, their flesh not only wholesome and 

 curative but miraculous in its virtues, endowing with the 

 knowledge of the speech of animals, and of the hiding-place 

 of buried treasures, and their effigies to be the acknowledged 

 crest and trade-mark of physicians from ^Esculapius to 

 Holloway. Hygeia herself always carries a serpent; and 

 in this connection how delightfully consular and Roman is 

 that anecdote of Exagoras, the ambassador from Cyprus. 

 He came to Rome and bored them all so dreadfully with 

 talking about the virtues of herbs and snakes that the 

 consuls had him put into a tank full of serpents to test his 

 long-winded theories. And the odd thing was, the vipers 

 would not touch the ambassador. 



Nor, as a testimonial to the serpent's ability as an herbalist, 

 is the following incident to be neglected. Glaucus, son of 

 Minos, died, and the king, his father, in a high-handed 

 fashion, shut up a certain one in the family vault with the 

 corpse, telling him that he should never come out alive 

 unless his son did so too. The unfortunate man sat him 

 down, disconsolately enough, we may suppose, by the side 

 of the dead body, when, suddenly, there appeared a snake, 

 which, as he saw it was about to crawl upon the bier, he 



