Occasional Notes. 121 
by death ; was the result. Special care was taken that 
no mechanical injury should be done to the nerve ganglia; 
and the effe6l of simple pun&ure, without scorpion poison, 
was tried. In all cases where simple pun6lure produced 
no ill effe6ts whatever, the introdu6lion of scorpion 
poison caused instant paralysis and death within a very 
short space of time. 
Scorpions kept in confinement are easily induced to 
fight. Mr. BOURNE kept scorpions in confinement, and 
observed them repeatedly sting each other while fighting, 
and yet they lived perfe6lly well. 
It was formerly believed that scorpions when placed 
within a ring of fire, after making frantic and futile efforts 
to pass the circle, would deliberately commit suicide by 
stinging themselves to death. Mr. BOURNE'S experi- 
ments have shew T n that under such circumstances the 
scorpions certainly would lash about marvellously with 
their sting and even accidentally wound themselves, but 
that death resulted not from the poison which really 
has no fatal influence on the scorpion itself, but from the 
heat of the fire which surrounded it. 
Prof. Lloyd Morgan fully confirms Prof. Bourne's 
conclusion that the poison of the scorpion has no fatal 
effe6l on the same individual or another individual of the 
same or even allied species. He believes, however, as the 
result of his own experiments, that the poison has some 
effe6l, producing sluggishness and torpor for a while. 
He also confirms Sir Joseph Fayrer'S conclusion that 
the poison of the viper has no effe6l on itself — neither on 
the individual from which the poison is taken nor on 
other individuals of the same species. 
At the same time it can easily be understood that 
Q 
