after Death from Snake- bite. 79 
mould with the same until medical assistance was sent for.” 
About half an hour after the discovery, Mr. Fitzgerald says : 
“ T found the patient in astate of stupor (like a person under 
the influence of a narcotic). He had a fair pulse, about 80. 
The extremities were below the natural temperature, and 
the surface of the skin generally covered with a cold 
moisture. ‘The power of speech was lost: when attempting 
to speak the words seemed so thick that they could not be 
understood.” In eight or ten minutes after this, although 
stimulants were freely given, the symptoms changed very 
much. ‘The patient had lost all consciousness, and his 
face and lips were livid ; respiration scarcely to be noticed, 
and pulse difficult to detect.” He was then removed to the 
hospital, where he died in about halfan hour; Mr. Fitz- 
gerald remarking that “his respiration stopped from ten to 
fourteen minutes before the heart’s action.” Dr. Moussé 
says, “On arriving at the hospital he was in a dying state, 
the general appearance was livid, and the temperature of the 
body so lowered that it could be felt by the touch.” 
The next day a post-mortem examination was made, at 
which I was invited to be present. Nothing abnormal was 
discovered except fluid alkaline dark blood and some con- 
gestion of the lungs. I took a little of the blood from the 
spinal canal, and placed it under the microscope in Dr. 
Moussé’s room. It appeared to contain a very large quantity 
of colourless corpuscles, of large size. With this observation 
I left. 
The same evening the cobra was brought to me. I made 
it insensible with chloroform, and turned it into a jar of 
spirit till the next day, when I removed all the poison I 
could, about half a drachm or more, and reserving a little for 
microscopic examination, injected the remainder beneath the 
skin of the abdomen of a full sized dog. The animal died 
after the usual symptoms during the same night. 
POST-MORTEM EXAMINATION. 
The subcutaneous tissue was infiltrated with dark serum, 
extending nearly as high as the axilla and down to the 
thigh ; outwards nearly as far as the spine, inwards a little 
bey ond the linea alba. 
No evidence whatever of inflammation or disease of any 
_ internal organ or of the lymphatics. 
The blood was in parts in a semi-fluid, in parts in a fluid 
state. No fibrinous coagula anywhere. 
“a 2 
