122 INDIAN SNAKE POISONS, 



Experiment III. 



The same solution that was used in the last experi- 

 ment was again heated for another thirty minutes to the 

 same temperature (107° C. or 224°"6 F.), and one cubic 

 centimetre of it (containing five centigrammes or '77 

 grain of the poison) afterwards injected into a fowl. 



2.46 P.M. Injection. 



3.56 P.M. Head drooping. 



7.23 P.M. Convulsions. 



7.35 P.M. Dead. 



The same amount of poison, though heated for an 

 hour to 107° C, in solution again killed with all the 

 symptoms of cobra-poisoning. Now, though at the 

 present time it would be difficult to say exactly what is 

 or is not an infecting organism, or what the conditions 

 of its vitality may he, yet little will be risked hy stating 

 that no life-possessing " germ " could possibly survive 

 the treatment that the active agent of cobra-poison did 

 in these experiments. 



But there is evidence that a high temperature has 

 some effect on the poison ; for when the solution had 

 been exposed to the heat for half an hour, five centi- 

 grammes took only thirty minutes to destroy life, 

 whereas after an hour's exposure they required four 

 hours and fifty minutes. 



Experiment IV. *" 



The same solution that had been used in the last two 



