COPHIAS LANCEOLATUS. 97 



had then completely overcome them. Eight days before, at the 

 foot of this same mountain, a fisherman, shooting with his canoe over 

 the volcanic pebbles of the shore, was attacked by a similar reptile 

 concealed among the basalts, and no effort could save his life."* 



The serpents of which we are speaking are seldom found in the 

 towns ; but they frequently approach them, particularly in the 

 night ; and in the country they frequently penetrate into the inte- 

 rior of the houses, when they are surrounded by bushy and high 

 grass ; and they are said to prefer the cottages of the negroes. But 

 it is particularly in the plantations of sugar-canes that these rep- 

 tiles find an asylum, concealing themselves under the long decayed 

 leaves with which the earth is covered, and feeding on lizards, small 

 birds, and especially on rats, with which the plantations abound. 

 They are also attracted by poultry-yards and aviaries ; they fre- 

 quently lie in ambush in the parasitic plants, which surround the 

 fallen trunks of trees, or remain covered up in the nests of birds 

 whose eggs or young they have devoured. 



" These reptiles," continues the able translator of Cuvier, to 

 whose work I am indebted for much interesting information on 

 this class of animals, " possesses an activity and vivacity of motion 

 truly alarming. A ferocious instinct induces them to dart impetu- 

 ously upon passengers, either by suddenly letting go the sort of spring 

 which their body forms, rolled in concentric and superpoised circles, 

 and thus shooting like an arrow from the bow of a vigorous archer, 

 or pursuing them by a series of rapid and multiplied leaps, or 

 climbing up trees after them, or even threatening them in a 

 vertical position. 



" The effects of the bite of these serpents are in general very 

 terrible, but vary considerably, according to a multitude of circum- 

 stances. The tumefaction of the part, which soon becomes livid and 

 gangrenous, nausea, convulsions, cardialgia, and an invincible som- 

 nolency, are the ordinary symptoms of the action of their poison, 

 which either produce death in the course of some hours, or at most 

 some days, or causes for several years vertigos, paralysis, more or less 



♦ See Monographic du Trigonocephale des Antilles, ou Grand Vipere Fer-de- 

 Lance de la Martinique, par A, Moreau de Jonnes, Svo. Paris, 1816. 



L 



