The Start 15 



the diminution in the mortality from snake-bites in the 

 province of Sao Paulo. 



In connection with his institute, and right by the 

 laboratory, the doctor has a large serpentarium, in which 

 quantities of the common poisonous and non-poisonous 

 snakes are kept, and some of the rarer ones. He has 

 devoted considerable time to the effort to find out if 

 there are any natural enemies of the poisonous snakes of 

 his country, and he has discovered that the most for- 

 midable enemy of the many dangerous Brazilian snakes 

 is a non-poisonous, entirely harmless, rather uncommon 

 Brazilian snake, the mussurama. Of all the interesting 

 things the doctor showed us, by far the most interesting 

 was the opportunity of witnessing for ourselves the ac- 

 tion of the mussurama toward a dangerous snake. 



The doctor first showed us specimens of the various 

 important snakes, poisonous and non-poisonous, in alco- 

 hol. Then he showed us preparations of the different 

 kinds of venom and of the different anti-venom serums, 

 presenting us with some of the latter for our use on the 

 journey. He has been able to produce two distinct kinds 

 of anti-venom serum, one to neutralize the virulent poi- 

 son of the rattlesnake's bite, the other to neutralize the 

 poison of the different snakes of the lachecis genus. 

 These poisons are somewhat different and moreover 

 there appear to be some differences between the poisons 

 of the different species of lachecis; in some cases the 

 poison is nearly colorless, and in others, as in that of 

 the jararaca, whose poison I saw, it is yellow. 



But the vital difference is that between all these poi- 

 sons of the pit-vipers and the poisons of the colubrine 



