FURTHER EXPERIMENTS. 317 



of " Isibiba " with a piece of banana, 1 gave it to the monkey. 

 After an interval of fifteen minutes, a four-foot Brown Cape 

 Cobra, or Bruin Kapell {Naiafiava), which had been in captivit}' 

 a year, and was in poor condition, bit the animal on the tail, 

 one foot from the root, on a spot previously shaved. Within 

 one minute the site of the bite was scarified thoroughly, and 

 " Isibiba " powder rubbed in. Other incisions were made 

 between the site of the bite and the heart, and more " Isibiba " 

 rubbed in. After an interval of two minutes, more of the 

 remedy was applied to the incisions. Each incision was 

 smothered with it. As is usual in cases of bites from Cobras, 

 the animal did not suffer any pain. The only pain was a momen- 

 tary twinge when the rapid incisions in the skin were made with 

 a sharp lancet. The animal did not show the least sign of any 

 inconvenience for fifteen minutes. Then it began to get drowsy. 

 This was due to the paralysing action of the Cobra venom on 

 the nerve centres. This increased progressively until the animal 

 became unconscious. It died in forty minutes. After breathing 

 ceased, the heart beat vigorously for five minutes, then gradually 

 slowed and stopped after another two minutes. This is not 

 unusual in cases of death from Cobra venom. It has always 

 occurred in my experience, hence the reason I advocate the 

 adoption of artificial respiration methods, if breathing should 

 cease suddenly. On dissection, it was clearly evident the animal 

 had died of Cobra venom poisoning, and not from any possible 

 toxic action of the " Isibiba." Subsequent experiments of a 

 conclusive nature have confirmed the negative results of the 

 first case. It is unnecessary to give them in detail. 



Further Experiments. 

 After the publication of the results of the Isibiba experiments 

 in the several South African Agricultural Journals, I received 

 the following communication from a well-known gentleman in 

 Natal. He wrote : " I have discussed your direct statement 

 with regard to Isibiba I have witnessed both animals and human 

 beings bitten by Puff Adders and Night Adders. In all these 

 cases Isibiba was used, both internally and externally, with un- 

 quahfied success. I mention this, because I have seen the snakes 

 which caused the bites, and the antidote, and knew it to be 

 Isibiba." 



