190 Life and Immortality. 
popular belief that a rattle is added every year, and that it 
is pessible to determine the age of the animals by this 
means, is not borne out by facts. Sometimes two rattles 
are known to appear within a year, and other instances are 
recorded where four have been attained in that period, and 
others still when several have been lost, new ones taking 
their places. The number of rattles is also uncertain. The 
greatest number, as observed by Dr. Holbrook, is twenty- 
one, but a specimen is mentioned in the books that had 
forty-four. 
Mild and peaceful in disposition, the Rattlesnake has never 
been known, unless provoked, to attack a human being, nor 
to follow him with hostile intention. He preys upon small 
animals, as rats, squirrels, rabbits and birds, and can always 
be approached when he is stretched out, only striking when 
he is coiled. He is not a climber, seldom, if ever, being 
found in trees. His alleged powers of fascination are purely 
mythical. The horror his presence inspires often paralyzes 
with fear his victim, who, incapable of flight, stupidly awaits 
his fate. Men, women and children have been known, when 
attacked by these animals, to become rooted to the spot, as 
it were, by fear and surprise. All the so-called cases of 
fascination can be explained by the fear which the snake’s 
unlooked-for presence inspires. 
Wonderful curative powers are imputed to the oil of the 
Rattlesnake. Many snakes are killed during the summer 
months for this oil, but the grand gathering of the crop is 
in the fall, when they have repaired to their dens and winter- 
ing places. Sunny days in October and November are 
chosen by snake-hunters for raiding them. The snakes, dull 
and sluggish at that time of the year, crawl out of their 
dens upon the rocks, huddling together by the score for the 
purpose of basking in the sun. Armed with old-fashioned 
flails the hunters, when they come upon a group of snakes, 
proceed at once to thresh them, but few making good their 
escape. The Rattlesnakes, assorted from other species that 
