458 
H. C. YARROW. 
EXPERIMENTS WITH CROTALUS YENOM IN SNAKES AND LIZARDS. 
Fontana, in his celebrated work on poisons, states as a law 
that the venom of a serpent is not a poison for itself or for other 
species, whether harmless or otherwise, and a few interesting ex¬ 
periments have been tried with a view to determine the question, 
particularly as a mass of conflicting evidence exists. Weir 
Mitchell, in his early work, was convinced that the poison of 
Crotalus, when injected hypodermically into the same species, 
could kill, but in his last volume he states this is not the case. 
Fayrer does not believe that the poison of cobra is poisonous to 
itself, while Vincent Richards holds an opposite view. Dr. J. 
Dormet publishes in Nature , London, 1883-4, XXIX., p. 504, 
an account of a black snake of Australia, which, being held forci¬ 
bly and provoked, turned and bit itself just behind the head, 
death taking place in one minute. Our experiments show that 
Crotalus venom is not poisonous to rattlesnakes, eutaenias (garter 
snakes) or lizards. The first experiment was upon Eutcenia sir- 
talis , the common garter snake. 
Oct. 28.—12:15 p. m. —Injected two drops of glycerine venom 
and three drops of water into muscular tissue of belly of Eutoenia. 
3 p. m. —Snake in as good condition as before injection. 
Oct. 29.—Snake all right. 
12:20 p. m. —Injected three drops of glycerine venom and 
three drops of water into muscular tissue of belly of Crotalus. 
3 p. m. —Snake as lively as ever and shows no effect whatever 
of the venom. 
Oct. 30.—Snake all right. 
12:30 p. m. —Injected five minims of venom solution and five 
minims of water into same Eutcenia used before. No result. In¬ 
jected ten minims into small Crotalus , no result having been ob¬ 
tained bv five minims. 
9 / 
Oct. 31.—No result. 
Allowed large vigorous Crotalus to strike Eutcenia (the same 
one used before) twice in muscles of the back. 
Nov. 1 . —No result. 
Nov. 4.—No result. 
