ORDINARY MEETING.* 

 H. Cadman Jones, Esq., M.A., in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the last Meeting were read and confirmed, and the 

 following Elections were announced : — 



Members : — Major-General W. L. Geary, C.B., R.A. ; The Eev. Towns- 

 end Storrs, M.A., Head Master, the Grammar School, Doncaster. 



Associates :— The Eev. Canon Baker, F.L.S., F.S.Sc, J.P., Cape of 

 Good Hope ; The Rev. E. Herbruck, A.B., A.M., Ph.D., Ed. Christian 

 World, United States ; The Rev. Alexander Macpherson, Scotland ; 

 J. Whitehead, Esq., F.G.S., Guernsey. 



The following Paper was then read by the Author : — 



ON SERPENT-WORSHTP AND ON THE VENOMOUS 

 SNAKES OF INDIA AND THE MORTALITY 

 CAUSED BY THEM. By Sir Joseph Fayrer, 

 K.C.S.I.,- LL.D., M.D., F.R.S. 



THE serpent is the ancient enemy of the human race, and 

 it is still held in antipathy, not only by man, but by the 

 lower animals. In man, this is probably due as much or more 

 to the lethal properties of some forms, as to the repulsiveness of 

 their aspect generally ; while animals seem to be instinctively 

 imbued with the dread of them. The destructive qualities, 

 albeit the property of but few members of this large order, 

 have come to be attributed so universally to all, that the 

 innocent are classed with the guilty, and the harmless creature 

 which undulates so gracefully through the grass, is popularly 

 associated with the deadly cobra or rattlesnake. 



But although dread of their baneful properties may lie at the 

 root of the repugnance in which they are held, yet with this 

 feeling, no doubt, has been mingled a sentiment of veneration 

 for their supposed wisdom and supernatural power, which, 

 combined with fear, originated one of the earliest forms of 

 worship, in which superstition and religious feeling have found 

 expression, for coeval with the worship of trees, the heavenly 

 bodies, and other natural objects, we find that ophiolatry has 

 been general throughout the world from the remotest 

 antiquity. 



* March 7, 1892. 



