Book II. Travels in India. 



There is the Serpent-Stone not to be forgot, about the bignefs of a double • 

 and fome are almoft oval., thick in the middle, and thin about the fides. The /»« 

 dians report that it is bred in the head of certain Serpents. But I rather take it 

 to be a Story of the Idolater's Prielts, and that the Stone is rather a compofition 

 of certain drugs. Whatever it be, it is of excellent vertue to drive any venom 

 out of thofe that are bit by venomous creatures. If the perfbn bit be not much 

 wounded, the place mult be incis'd ; and the Stone being appli'd thereto, will not 

 fall off. till it has drawn all the poifon to it. To cleanfe it, you rauft fteep it in 

 Womans-milk, or for want of that, in Cows-milk j after the Stone has lain ten or 

 twelve hours, the milk will turn to the colour of an Apoftemated matter. The 

 Arch-Bifhop of Goa carrying me to his Cabinet of Rarities, lhew'd me one of 

 thefe Stones : and after he had afTur'd me of the rare qualities it had, he gave it 

 me. Once as he crofs'd a Merfh in the Ifland of Salfete where Goa ftands., one of 

 the men that cafri'd his Pallequls, being half naked, was bit by a Serpent, and heal'd 

 at the fame time. I bought feveral ; but there are none but the Br amines that 

 fell them, which makes me believe that they compound them. There are two 

 ways to try whether the Serpent-Stone be true or falfe. The firft is, by putting 

 the Stone in your mouth, for then it will give a leap, and fix to the palate. The 

 other is, by putting it in a glafs full of water ; for if the Stone be true, the wa- 

 ter will fall a boyling, and rile in little bubbles up to the top of the Glafs. 



There is another Stone, which is call'd the Serpent's-Stone with the hood. This 

 is a kind of Serpent that has a kind of a hood hanging down behind the head, as 

 it is reprefented in the Figure. And it is behind this hood that the Stone is found, 

 many times as big as a Pullet's-egg. There are fome Serpents both in Afia and 

 America of a monftrous bignefs, 2 y foot long i as was that, the skin whereof is 

 kept in Batavia, which had fwallow'd a Maid of 18 years of age. Thefe Stones 

 are not found in any of thofe Serpents that are not at leaft two foot long. This 

 Stone being rubb'd againft another Stone, yields a certain flime, which be- 

 ing drank in water by the perfon that has the poifon in his body, powerfully drives 

 it out. Thefe Serpents are no- where to be found but upon the Coafts of Mellnde 5 

 but for the Stones you may buy them of the Portuguese Mariners and Souldiers 

 that come from Mozambique. 



*Xi CHAP. 



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