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SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
4 
leg was amputated at four p. m. that day, was 
dead by midnight.* 
Administering brandy in large doses, (in fact 
until intoxication is produced) seems the most 
efficacious antidote to the poisonous bite of 
these reptiles. Ammonia, if at hand, is bene- 
ficial; but the other seemed more generally 
successful when tried, on both man and beast. 
16. — To this may be added the " Scarp- 
sticker" of the Dutch, or Mght- Adder;" a 
small dingy-brown Adder, spotted with Jblaek, 
about eighteen inches long.j* 
17. — There is also the u House- Adder," a 
small brown one, about a foot in length, which 
lodges in old walls, under floors, and found, not 
* There is a tradition amongst the Kaffirs, that the young of the 
Puff Adder eat their way out of the womb of the old female, when 
the time of incubation is completed; thus " bringing through its life, 
death to its parent." 
f A young traveller in the Colony, some short time ago, had a 
very narrow escape from one of these Night- Adders. He was riding 
on a journey, and in the heat of mid -day, he dismounted under a tree 
in the bush, off-saddled his horse, knee-haltered him, and turned him 
loose. He then put his saddle on the ground, and placing his head 
between its flaps, fell asleep. He slept till near evening, and then 
rising in haste, called in his horse, and saddled him. Ere mounting, 
however, he remembered that his near stirrup was too short, and in 
turning up the flap to draw down the buckle, he found a long Night- 
Adder, coiled in under it : having been attracted by the warmth, it 
had crept in whilst he was asleep. Had he, unwittingly, mounted, 
without discovering this, he would, of course, have been bitten by 
the Adder, the moment his leg had pressed him. As it was, by a 
single blow from his whip, he disabled his enemy, and soon succeeded 
in dispatching him. 
