126 
and elsewhere these often ossify in adult speci- 
mens, thus enhancing their purpose as a means 
of defense. 
But to come strictly within our title it is my 
only object here to briefly remark upon some 
of the opinions entertained in reference to the 
bite of this lizard. Now there are a great 
many people in Arizona, where //eloderma sius- 
pectum is found, and still more in Old Mexico, 
where its congener, H. horridum, ranges, that 
believe that the very breath of one of these 
reptiles breathed in a person’s face may prove 
to be poisonous, and as regards the bite there 
is but one opinion among this class of folk, and 
that is that it is almost invariably fatal. No 
less a well-known naturalist than Sinnichrast 
gives instances, citing the reports of Mexicans, 
where fowls and small mammals bitten by a 
Fleloderma have died within a few hours ; but 
his own experiments did not confirm them, 
While in London Sir John Lubbock, a most 
careful observer and naturalist, declares that he 
saw a frog die in a few moments from the bite 
of a lizard of this species which had been sent 
to him. A number of years ago the present 
writer was bitten by a large and infuriated 
Heloderma, but aside from some serious and 
painful symptoms at the time, and a swelling of 
the hand bitten, no permanent effects remained. 
Thus the bite and the results following the 
Same came gradually under the investigation 
of science. In 1883 two distinguished physic- 
ians, Mitchell and Reichert, of Philadelphia, 
published an admirable report upon the sub- 
ject, and declared, from a careful series ot ex- 
periments they had made with the saliva of 
living Helodermas, that there was no doubt 
whatever of its highly venomous nature, and 
the dictum of those so authoritative in such 
matters carried great weight everywhere. 
The tide of opinion changed somewhat, how- 
ever, when three years later Dr. H. C. Yarrow 
made some very excellent experiments at the 
Smithsonian Institution, and published his re- 
sults in Forest and Stream (New York, June 
14, 1888). His researches practically went to 
prove that in the case of chickens and rabbits, 
at least, the saliva absorbed copiously by them 
from the bite of an angry Heloderma was 
harmless. Still later, Professor Samuel Gar- 
NATURES REALM. 
man, of Harvard University, published it as his 
opinion that “in regard to the nature of the 
vemon and fatality of the bite (of a Heloderma) 
there is little to offer that is new. The results 
of the experiments suggest danger for small 
animals but little or none for larger ones. 
Large angle worms and insects seemed to die 
much more quickly when bitten than when cut 
to pieces with the scissors.” Thus the matter 
seems to stand at the present time—perhaps 
the vast majority of physicians who followed 
Doctors Mitchell and Reichert in their experi- 
ments fully believe to-day that the bite of a 
‘‘Gila monster ” will very often prove fatal even 
in the case of man; while, on the other hand, 
naturalists almost universally believe that the 
saliva of this saurian is hardly at all venomous, 
and then only under certain conditions. The 
subject will repay fuller investigation and re- 
search. There are also several questions to 
be carefully taken into consideration in future 
experiments and observations. In the first 
place, in the case of man, the condition of the 
victim at the ¢éme of the bite must be carefully 
recorded, and then one must be sure afterward 
that the patient, in the event of death, was not 
destroyed by the remedies given to offset the 
effects of the bite. As, for instance, a quart o 
whiskey or other strong alcoholic liquor will 
often, of itself, kill a rman outright. Again, 
when a Heloderma bites a pigeon, a chicken, 
rabbit or cat, does it zzvariably inject the 
wound with the supposed-to-be poisonous 
saliva? In connection with this it must be re- 
membered that this reptile often in nature 
catches and eats small mammals and birds, and 
it is just possible that he kills them by the wound 
inflicted by the bite alone, and injects nothing 
thereinto. This may be the case in some ot 
the animals he has bitten in the hands of ex- 
perimenters. A reptile may have sufficient 
control over a poison gland situated beneath 
its jaws as zo¢ to call its secretion into use 
every time he bites. He may possess an in- 
nocuous éuzcca/ secretion 72 addition to the 
poisonous secretion of the submaxillary gland. 
In view of this possibility, it is an open ques- 
tion, owing to the different methods employed 
to obtain it, whether Doctors Mitchell and 
Reichert and Doctor Yarrow obtained the 
