POISONS FBOM ANIMAL KINGDOM 125 



Flower gives a list of tliii'ty-four poisonous snakes 

 occurring in the Malay Peninsula (Bef. 4), and it is 

 curious that only the black cobra mentioned above and 

 a common green tree-snake {idar puclwk, Dryophis 

 prasinus, Boie— Dipsadomorphinae), which by many 

 Malays is held to be non-poisonous, seem to be employed 

 by Kelantan poisoners. As a poison the bile of the 

 green tree-snake is used mixed with that of the green 

 water-frog and that of the jimgle-crow. This prepara- 

 tion, smeared on the gambier which is used in betel- 

 chewing, is said to cause the appearance of blood in the 

 urine* 



The slender and graceful tree-snake Dryophis 

 prasmus also occms in the Philippines, where it is 

 popularly supposed to live among the rice stalks and is 

 known as daFnin-palay, In the Philippines its bite is 

 said by natives to be fatal in from fifteen minutes to 

 half an hour ; it is even believed that the leaves wither 

 upon which its breath has fallen. Griffin says, how^ever, 

 when reporting on the poisonous snakes of the Pliihp- 

 pine Islands : " While undoubtedly poisonous, this 

 snake is one of those in which the fangs are at the back 

 end of the maxilla, so far back that the snake would 

 have to stretch its mouth tremendously to bite an 

 object the size of a man's leg." 



The folklore of Malayan snakes is recorded by Skeat 

 in " Malay Magic " ; it is full of fantastic ideas and 

 curious myths. Two examples of strange snakes need 

 mention, the ular belerang, a fabulous red sea-snake, so 

 venomous that a bite from it on the rudder of a boat 

 will suffice to kill the crew, and ular chiniamaniy a 

 fictitious gold-yellow snake, the finding of which 

 betokens success in love (Ref. 13). 



