DESERT ANIMALS 



169 



The rattle is indescribable, but a person will 

 know it the first time he hears it. It is some- 

 thing between a buzz and a burr, and can 

 cause a cold perspiration in a minute fraction 

 of time. The snake is very slow ia getting 

 ready to strike, in fact sluggish ; but once the 

 head shoots out, it does so with the swiftness of 

 an arrow. Nothing except the road-runner can 

 dodge it. The poison is deadly if the fang has 

 entered a vein or a fleshy portion of the body 

 where the flow of blood to the heart is free. If 

 struck on the hand or foot, the man may re- 

 cover, because the circulation there is slow and 

 the heart has time to repel the attack. Every 

 animal on the desert knows just how venomous 

 is that poison. Even your dog knows it by in- 

 stinct. He may shake and kill garter-snakes, 

 but he will not touch the rattlesnake. 



All of the spider family are poisonous and 

 you can find almost every one of them on the 

 desert. The most sharp-witted of the family is 

 the trap-door spider — the name coming from 

 the door which he hinges and fastens over the 

 entrance of his hole in the ground. The taran- 

 tula is simply an overgrown spider, very heavy 

 in weight, and inclined to be slow and stupid 

 in action. He is a ferocious-looking wretch 



The rattle- 

 snake. 



Effect of the 

 poison. 



Spiders amd 

 tarantulas. 



