340 



ON SYMPATHY AND FASCINATION. 



In the difficulty of accounting for this most extraordinary influence, there 

 are some persons who have ventured, as in the preceding cases, to doubt the 

 truth of the fact, since, in the marvellous, it will always be found far more 

 easy to doubt than to determine, though the belief of it has been very gene- 

 rally gaining ground within the course of the last half-century. Pennant 

 seems to allow it with some degree of hesitation, admitting, however, the 

 authority of those who have asserted it. Dr. Mead endeavoured to account 

 for it upon the principle of mere terror ; my late learned friend, Professor 

 Barton of Philadelphia, upon that of a courageous daring of parent animals 

 in defence of their young, in consequence of which they often adventure too 

 near, and are seized upon ; Dr. Barton apprehending that this is a fate which 

 more frequently pursues older than younger animals. Neither of these ex- 

 planations, however, can be very readily assented to ; the first being inade- 

 quate to the effect produced, and the second being contrary to the general 

 observations of naturalists who have treated upon the subject : in conse- 

 quence of which Major A. Gordon, of South Carolina, has since ventured upon 

 another explanation, which is highly ingenious, and may hereafter, perhaps, 

 be fully substantiated. In a paper published by him in the New York His- 

 torical Society, he attributes the fascinating power supposed to be possessed 

 by serpents to a vapour which they secrete, and can throw around them to a 

 certain distance at pleasure. He advances various facts in support of this 

 opinion, and observes, that the vapour produces a sickening and stupifying 

 effect; and alludes to a negro who, from a peculiar acuteness of smell, could 

 discover a rattlesnake at a distance of two hundred feet when in the exercise 

 of this power, from his smell being affected by it ; and who, on following such 

 indication, always found some animal drawn within its vortex, and struggling 

 with its influence.* 



Should this asserted fact be confirmed hy others of a like kind, it will give 

 us an insight into the nature, not only of the present, but of similar fascina- 

 tions, which we stand much in need of. The greater acuteness of smell in 

 barbarous and uncultivated tribes than in those of civilized nations, we have 

 already had occasion to notice, and have endeavoured to account for.f In 

 some instances it is highly probable that the emanation is alone perceptible 

 by the animals that are overpowered by it; which may be the case in the 

 example of serpent-charmers, and sometimes in the fascination of serpents 

 themselves. In other examples, and especially those of artificial emanations, 

 there is an odour of which everyone is sensible, though its captivating power 

 is confined to the particular tribe to which it is directed ; and I now allude to 

 the mode of charming trout and other fresh-water fishes, by illining the hand 

 with asafcetida, to which, indeed, we had occasion to refer in a former lec- 

 ture. | The trout, in its intoxication of delight (for here the charm is accom- 

 panied with a forcible pleasure instead of a forcible pain), resigns all caution, 

 becomes dead to its natural instinct, and so far from flying from the ensnaring 

 hand when introduced into the water, advances to it irresistibly, as the bird 

 to the jaws of the rattlesnake, and suffers itself to be laid hold of and fall a 

 prey to the decoyer. 



There is, hence, nothing in the accounts of these curious powers of fasci- 

 nation that is hostile to our own experience : and though our own senses may 

 not be fine enough to detect the medium of action in every instance, whether 

 natural or artificial, we have some reason for ascribing it generally to an 

 overwhelming emanation, capable of leading captive the ordinary instincts 

 and faculties of the animals upon which it is exercised, and hereby of hurry- 

 ing them headlong to destruction. Catesby, the best natural historian of 

 North America, while admitting that he had never witnessed an instance of 

 the fascination of the rattlesnake, asserts that he had received one uniform 

 account of it from a variety of persons who had witnessed it ; nor is it, 

 indeed, denied by Dr. Mead or Professor Barton, but only attempted to be 

 accounted for upon principles which will not apply, or are not adequate. 



* Journal of Science, &c. No. xii. p. 374. t Series z. Lecture xv. t Id. ibid. 



