July, 1919 
FOREST AND STREAM 
333 
Look sharp! There in the distance are the egrets, herons and blue-legs, winging 
across a bleak stretch of saw grass country. 
the suspicious circumstances under which 
they had been taken along, the others 
were inclined to look upon them with less 
misgivings. 
The entire party were now on the Mae, 
although the belongings of “The Man 
with the Red Beard,” and his younger 
companion were still deftly concealed un- 
der a tarpaulin in their own batteau. 
A t eleven o’clock after a decidedly 
tortuous passage, they came to the 
innumerable mangrove keys at the 
mouth of the pass, and a second halt 
was necessary because of the Mae’s co- 
quettish motor. And it was during this 
lull in proceedings that John dropped a 
line overboard. He had only salt pork 
for bait and was trusting to luck to land 
something, for the pass was known to be 
filled with fish. 
Hendry was the first to see the boy 
as he began a dance on the deck, having 
evidently made some sort of important 
strike. A moment later he had thrown 
a wriggling, thrashing object almost at 
his feet, and before the guide could reach 
him, he was attempting to extract his 
hook from the mouth of an enormous 
brown moray, no less than two and a 
half feet long. 
Hendry made a leap for John and 
dragged him away. 
“Big little fool!” he exclaimed, “rather 
have water mocassin or rattlesnake bite 
me than moray. Him dreadful poison. 
Kill quick. No do anything.” 
Mr. King was ready to verify this 
statement. 
And he, too, cautioned John against 
ever getting on too familiar terms with 
the brown moray of Chokoloskee Pass. 
“If that thing had bitten you,” said 
he, “we might have had to carry you 
back to Miami in a pine box. Its bite 
is venemous to a degree.” 
“Yes, but you have your medicine kit,” 
John answered. He had every confidence 
in his father to cure all ills. 
“It’s just as Hendry tells you,” Mr. 
King continued “the moray is a dan- 
gerous customer. There would be but 
one thing to do: a quick rope or cord 
tourniquet above the wound — as tight as 
we could make it. Then hypodermics — 
a circle of them — of permanganate of 
potash in solution around the actual 
wound, followed by jabs directly in the 
wound.” John, Jr., was visibly impressed. 
“And what does that do?” the boy de- 
manded. 
“Permanganate of potash is a vigor- 
ous germicide,” said his father, “it has 
peculiar properties all its own. Its ten- 
dency would be to nullify the germs and 
force them to the surface. You would 
have an ugly looking limb for a while 
and, finally, the poison would come to 
the surface in the shape of an ugly sore. 
But it would be better than dying, that’s 
sure. All of this would have to be done 
quickly, of course. I never travel in 
these parts without the hypo needle and 
a phial of the solution.” 
“A good drink of whiskey is the stuff 
for snake bites,” interrupted one of the 
strangers, who had ambled up. 
“And that is where you are mistaken,” 
Mr. King quickly replied, “when will peo- 
ple get that fallacy out of their heads. 
The heart stimulus of alcohol is short- 
lived and the let-down afterwards far 
from beneficial in cases of this kind. 
Never use whiskey for snake bites, my 
friend. The heart must be stimulated, 
of course, for snake poison tends to im- 
mediately weaken the action of the heart, 
since the blood takes it up instantly, but 
strychnine is effective. And morphine — 
you notice that it is part of our equip- 
ment. Those who fare forth into far 
and dangerous places always take a sup- 
ply of this drug. It is the court of last 
resort. A leg is broken — a wound is 
suffered that will never be healed — death 
is inevitable. Rather than die a lin- 
gering death these unfortunates end it 
all by the easiest route. I refer, of 
course, to cases where a man is out on a 
solitary expedition — alone. By the way, 
there is another method of using the 
permanganate of potash — perhaps an 
easier way. It may be had in crystals. 
The bite is slashed, to considerable depth,, 
and the crystals smeared into it — this, 
you understand, after the tourniquet has 
been set.” 
After this little lecture, John, Jr., 
made a mental resolve to give morays a 
wide berth in the future. But he did 
catch several edible fish before the en- 
gine was repaired, and their trip re- 
sumed. 
A t three in the afternoon, the Mae 
had reached Pavilion Key, where it 
was decided to stop for a short 
while, en route to Chatham Bend River. 
For the last lap of the memorable jour- 
ney was to take them up this picturesque 
stream and well into the interior. 
Pavilion Key is a pictureque sand 
ridge in crescent form. Around and 
about it are innumerable fine oyster bars, 
and some of the lower sand ridges are 
subject to overflow during those sweeping 
tides of the gulf. 
Like explorers upon a desert isle, the 
five members of the party walked around 
the crescent in the brilliant afternoon 
Thinking it all over in camp and deciding that life in the big outdoors has 
everything else beaten a mile. 
