104 SNAKES 



so much, is headed, and blown, or battered, to pieces. 

 Then its head is pounded to a jelly, for the servants 

 are agreed that, if this precaution is omitted, it 

 will revive during the night and come and coil 

 itself on the chest of its murderer. 



Finally a council is held and a unanimous resolu- 

 tion recorded that deceased was a serpent of the 

 deadliest kind. This is not a lie, for they believe 

 it ; but in the great majority of cases it is an untruth. 

 Of our two hundred and thirty-seven kinds of snakes 

 only forty-four are ranked by naturalists as venomous, 

 and many of these are quite incapable of killing 

 any animal as large as a man. Others are very rare 

 or local. In short, we may reckon the poisonous 

 snakes with which we have any practical concern 

 at four kinds, and the chance of a snake found in 

 the house belonging to one of these kinds stands at 

 less than one in ten. 



It is a sufficiently terrible thought, however, that 

 there are even four kinds of reptiles going silently 

 about the land whose bite is certain death. If they 

 knew their powers and were maliciously disposed, 

 our life in the East would be like Christian's progress 

 through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. But 

 the poisonous snakes are just as timid as the rest, 

 and as little inclined to act on the offensive" against 

 any living creature except the little animals on 

 which they prey. Even a trodden worm will turn, 

 and a snake has as much spirit as a worm. If a man 

 treads on it, it will turn and bite him. But it has no 



