338 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
vitae hedge, so thick as to be impenetrable, al- ] 
most, to the vision. The ground work of the 
garden is a beautiful grass-plat, bordered by 
neatly-kept walks. For once we were delighted 
to have fallen upon a flower garden, where 
grass, the most common and beautiful of all 
green things, was duly appreciated. The flow¬ 
ers were in borders and beds about this little 
lawn, and so tastefully arranged, that the art 
was not visible. Here were a great variety of 
shrubs and flowers. We noticed splendid roses, 
dahlias, ladies’ slippers, lark spurs, stock jillies, 
and sweet williams, with many other rarer flow¬ 
ers. A belt of shrubbery and evergreen trees 
separate this part of the garden from the lawn 
and the grounds about the carriage-house and 
stables, giving it an air of entire seclusion. If 
there is a lovlier scene than this flower garden 
presents at sunrise, when every shrub is loaded 
with dew drops, and every flower is distilling its 
balm upon, the morning air, we have not had 
the good fortune to behold it. 
THE CONSERVATORY 
is attached to the house, and forms its eastern 
wing. It is a large glazed structure, filled up in 
the most pei’fect manner for storing the plants, 
and for giving them suitable shade, heat, and 
moisture. Two of the towers of the house were 
lined upon the inside with large copper cylin¬ 
ders, which receive the rains from the roof, and 
afford a large supply of water. This location of 
the green-house is, w r e think, much preferable 
to one at a distance from the house. The par¬ 
lor opens immediately upon it, and the family 
have access to it in all weathers, and at the sea¬ 
son when long walks out of doors are not at¬ 
tractive to the ladies. The building is now 
nearly emptied of its usual occupants, who are 
enjoying their summer vacation out in the bor¬ 
ders and along the walks. 
THE VINERY 
is probably the largest in the State, if not in the 
country. You have access to it by the carriage 
road as you pass out towards the north cottage, 
or much nearer, by a shaded foot-path. It is a 
span building, nearly two hundred feet in length, 
and is set in the midst of a vine border 60 feet 
wide, and thoroughly prepared with all the fer¬ 
tilizers the grape requires. The whole estab¬ 
lishment is completely fitted with the best ma¬ 
terials, and with every thing needed for success¬ 
ful vine culture. It was put up at a cost of 
about seven thousand dollars. We found here, 
at his work, Mr. Williams, the head gardener, 
and indeed the efficient manager of the whole 
estate. AYe were informed by the proprietor, 
that very great credit is due to this gentleman, 
for the successful cultivation of both farm and 
garden. He has charge of all the improvements, 
and directs all the labor employed upon the 
place. After an experience of some years with 
foreign gardeners, which was very unsatisfac¬ 
tory, he made his present engagement with Mr. 
Williams, and has had no occasion to regret it. 
An intelligent Yankee readily adapts himself to 
any kind of business ; and with suitable training, 
will give much better satisfaction to American 
employers than the graduates from the Duke of 
Devonshire’s garden, who, however skilful on 
English soil, have almost every thing to learn 
anew in our climate. Possibly, some of our 
rural improvers may profit by Mr. Ketchum’s 
experience. With no other instruction than 
Allen’s treatise on the grape, Mr. Williams 
showed us one of the finest graperies we ever 
visited. There were some twenty varieties of 
vines, now in the second year of their growth. 
The vines were very luxuriant and perfectly 
healthy. He had just cut three hundred berries 
from a single bunch, and still left enough to 
ripen. Little fruit of course will be allowed to 
mature this season while the vines are so young, 
but when they have attained their full strength, 
this vinery will turn out at least two tons of 
grapes annually. These, if sold at their market 
value, would be worth four thousand dollars—a 
glass house speculation which would not be very 
breaking. 
In front of the border are clusters of small 
fruit trees, and green house plants, and large 
parterres of flowers. These presented a gorge¬ 
ous sight as we saw them last autumn. Here 
were verbenas, heliotropes, china asters, salvias, 
ladies’ slippers, zinnias, petunias, the hibiscus, 
&c.; many of them in full bloom. The varie¬ 
ties are so arranged as to give a succession of 
flowers through the season. 
Our notice of the farm, we must reserve for 
another week. 
VENOM OF SERPENTS. 
There is in the minds of nearly every person 
a kind of continual dread of poisonous snakes 
and reptiles. That there are a great variety of 
these, investigations in the animal kingdom 
abundantly testify, but the number of persons 
actually bitten or injured by them is much 
smaller than is generally supposed. It is wisely 
arranged by an overruling Providence, that few 
or none of the poisonous reptiles will make an 
unprovoked attack upon human beings. A re¬ 
lative, who has resided in Hindoostan, as a mis¬ 
sionary, during several years past, tells us that 
Scorpions (not fatally poisonous) and the Cobra 
Capello—the most deadly poisonous of all 
snakes—are very abundant there, so much so, 
that it is not uncommon to find both of these 
reptiles in their beds and in other parts of their 
houses ; yet so comparatively harmless are they, 
that no dread is felt, and he has hardly known 
of a case of injury received from them. 
Dr. Gilman has recently been making a series 
of investigations upon the habits, &c., of poi¬ 
sonous serpents in the interior of Arkansas, a 
place which he says “appears to him to be the 
paradise of reptiles.” AVe give below an account 
of some of these researches, communicated to 
the St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal. It 
will be found interesting, and the results stated 
at the close of the article are quite instructive, 
especially the 5th section, in regard to alcohol. 
Other accounts verify the statement, that a free 
use of alcohol, internally and externally, has a 
very powerful counteracting effect upon the 
poison of a rattlesnake. 
There is much in the history and habits of 
the reptile tribes, however repulsive they may 
be in appearance, that is very interesting. 
During a sojourn of two or three months in the 
interior of Arkansas, which appears to me to 
be the paradise of reptiles, I paid some atten¬ 
tion to that branch of natural history called 
ophiology. I found four distinct varieties of 
rattlesnakes, ( crotalus ,) of which the Crotalus 
Horridus and Crotalus Kirtlandii, are by far the 
most numerous. The former is the largest ser¬ 
pent in North America. The family of mocca¬ 
sin, snakes (Colluber) is also quite numerous, 
there being not less than ten varieties, most of 
which are quite as venomous as the rattlesnake. 
By dissecting great numbers of - different spe¬ 
cies, I learned that the anatomical structure of 
the poisoning apparatus is similar in all the dif¬ 
ferent varieties of venomous serpents. It con¬ 
sists of a strong frame-work of bone, with its 
appropriate muscles in the upper part of the 
head, resembling, and being in fact, a pair of 
jaws, but externally -to the jaws proper, and 
much stronger. To these is attached, Joy a 
gingly moid articulation, one or more moveable 
fangs on each side, just at the verge of the 
mouth, capable of being erected at pleasure. 
These fangs are very hard, sharp, and crooked, 
like the claws of a cat, and hooked backward, 
with a hollow from the base to near the point. 
I have occasionally seen a thin slit of bone 
divide this hollow, making two. At their base . 
is found a small sack, containing two or three , 
drops of venom, which resembles thin honey: 
The sack is so connected with the cavity of the 
fang during its erection, that a slight upward 
pressure forces the vermon into the fang at its 
base, and it makes its exit at a small slit or 
opening near the point, with considerable force; 
thus it is carried to the bottom of any wound 
made by the fang. Unless the fangs are erected 
for battle, they lie concealed in the upper part 
of the mouth, sunk between the external and 
internal jaw-bones, somewhat like a penknife 
blade shut up in its handle, where they are 
covered by a fold of membrane, which encloses 
them like a sheath ;—this is the vagina dentis. 
There can be no doubt that these fangs are fre¬ 
quently broken off or shed, as the head grows 
broader, to make room for new ones nearer the 
verge of the mouth ; for, within the vagina 
dentis of a very large crotalus horridus, I found 
no less than five fangs on each side—in all 
stages of formation—the smallest in a half 
pulpy or cartilaginous state, the next something 
harder, the third still more perfect, and so on 
to the main, well-set, perfect fang. Each of 
these teeth had a well-defined cavity, like the 
main one. Three fangs on each side were fre¬ 
quently [found in copper-heads, vipers, and 
others. 
The process of robbing serpents of their 
venom is easily accomplished by the aid of 
chloroform, a few drops of which stupifies them. 
If, while they are under its influence, they are 
carefully seized by the neck, and the vagina 
dentis held out of the way by an assistant, with 
a pair of forceps, and the fang be erected and 
gently pressed upward, the venom will be seen 
issuing from the fang, dropping from its point. 
It may then be absorbed by a bit ef sponge, or 
caught in a vial, or on the point of a lancet. 
After robbing several serpents in this manner, 
they were found, after two days, to be as highly 
charged as ever with venom of equal intensity 
with that first taken. 
During the process of robbing several species 
of serpents, I inoculated several small but vig¬ 
orous and perfectly healthy vegetables with the 
point of a lancet, well charged with venom. 
The next day they were withered and dead, 
looking as though they had been scathed with 
lightning. In attempting to preserve a few 
drops of venom, for future experiments, in a 
small vital with two or three parts of alcohol, 
it was found in a short time to have lost its 
venomous properties. But after mixing the 
venom with aqua ammonia, or spirits of turpen¬ 
tine, or oil of peppermint, or of cinnamon, or 
of cloves, or with nitric or sulphuric acid, it 
still seemed to act with undiminished energy. 
It is best preserved, however, for future use by 
trituration with refined sugar or sugar of milk. 
A very fine, large cotton-mouth snake, being 
captured by putting a shoe-string around him, 
became excessively ferocious, striking at even 
the crack of a small riding-whip. Finding him¬ 
self a prisoner, without hope of escape, he 
turned his deadly weapons oil his own body, 
striking repeatedly his well-charged fangs deeply 
into his flesh. Notwithstanding this, he was put 
in a small basket, and carried forward. In one 
hour after he was found dead, and no amount 
of irritation could excite the least indication off 
