116 THE POISONOUS SNAKES OF INDIA. 



twice the size of the left, the tissues round the bitten part were 

 loiighing, and there was cellulitis of the foot and ankle. 



The abdomen was tender and swollen. He saw a tarry stool that 

 bad been recently voided. In spite of every endeavour to save the 

 patient, he continued to grow weaker and died from heart failure 

 at 2 A.M. on the 21st May. 



(Bemarlis. — The symptoms detailed above are all due to diminished 

 coagulability of the blood, such as we know is induced by the 

 poisons of both vipers and colubrine snakes. The absence of any 

 nervous phenomena negatives the idea that the culprit was a 

 colubrine species, whilst the severity of the symptoms arising from 

 the altered state of the blood, which we know, are specially pro- 

 nounced in viperine toxsemise, strengthens the assumption that it 

 was a viper that inflicted the injury. The casualty occurring near 

 Broach clearly points to the offender being either the " Phoorsa " 

 (ii'c/ii's ca/rinata), or Russell's viper (Viiyera russelU), but we cannot 

 be certain which. — F. W.) 



No. 3. 



Reported by me in the Bombaj" Natural History Journal (Vol. 

 XIX, p. 266). 



Bite from JEchis, 15 inches long. Toxaemia. Death 7 days later. 



Thanks to letters from Colonel Russell, R.A.M.C., and Mr. C. A. 

 Owen, I am able to put on record an instructive case of Uchis 

 ioxcemia which ended fatally. 



The bitten subject was a muscular male European, aged 47, 

 total abstainer and non-smoker, and in excellent health. He was 

 bitten at 10 a.m. on the 15th August 1908 at Rawal Pindi, 

 wounds being inflicted on fingers and back of the right hand and 

 the back of the left hand. He went '• at once " to the station 

 hospital where the wounds were " freely incised " and crystals of 

 permanganate of potash then rubbed in. Antivenene was then 

 injected subcutaneously. He had no symptoms that day up till 

 5 P.M., when he left hospital at his own request. 



On the 16th at 6 p.m. his wounds began to bleed spontaneously, 

 and he discharged blood in his urine and by the bowel. 



