370 CLASS REPTILIA. 



that at a period of antiquity the most remote, an invasion of 

 serpents of this kind depopulated a part of the country, 

 which probably gave occasion to Lucan to say, in the ninth 

 book of his Pharsalia, 



" Pro Csesare pugnant 

 Djpsades, et peragunt civilia bella cerastes." 



At the present day, when this reptile has been examined 

 by observers of a sound and unprejudiced judgment, the 

 bite of the cerastes is regarded as very dangerous, and yet 

 we are not in possession of facts sufficiently precise to deter- 

 mine its effects, nor of positive information respecting the 

 remedies opposed to them. We must consider as nothing, 

 all that is told us on this subject, by Dioscorides, Aetius, 

 Nicander of Colophon, Pliny, Paulus of Egina, and Celsus. 

 Sautes de Ardoynis merely informs us that this serpent is 

 of an excessively hot temperament, and that its poison is of 

 the most subtile kind. The first part of this description as 

 applied to any serpent is most absurd, and particularly false 

 as regards the cerastes. Actuarius says, that its bite occa- 

 sions delirium. Avicenna recommends to give to the wounded 

 person a grain of horse-radish in wine, or to cover the wound 

 with an onion, pounded in vinegar. It is not likely that 

 such a remedy can be of the least use. Bruce alone has 

 afforded us any data on this subject ; and as his statements 

 on this, as well as many other points, have excited severe 

 criticism, more particularly among French writers, we shall 

 present them to our readers as much abridged as possible, 

 and then offer a few remarks on that author himself and his 

 commentators. 



After telling us that the cerastes is a great lover of 

 heat (" for though the sun was burning hot all day, when 

 we made a fire at night, by digging a hole, and burning wood 

 to charcoal in it, for dressing our victuals, it was seldom we 



