JUST A MINUTE, PROFESSOR! 
It has been taught, and I think always without contradic¬ 
tion, that the king snake is fortified by a natural immunity to 
the venom of the rattlesnake. Just a minute, professor! It is 
not now our purpose to definitely contradict such teaching 
since, as already stated in the foreword, we lay claim to no 
scientific knowledge touching the subject, but have spent a life¬ 
time gathering in the most interesting observations, and have 
made a few in our own right which prove conclusively that 
many eminent scholars have missed their guess in their attempt 
to ferret out all of the mysterious practices of the diamond- 
back in the wild state. In the light of an observation I shall 
presently relate, I am not positive that a king snake kept in 
captivity for an extended period of time would survive an in¬ 
jection of the diamond-back’s venom. On the contrary, one in 
the wild state might, and then again he might not—let’s see. 
The point is this: During our boyhood we listened to some 
of our elders relating an interesting story of having witnessed 
a king snake holding a rattler at bay. Before making an at¬ 
tack, he went about diligently searching hither and yon. Finally 
he located the tender weed he sought and took two or three 
bites of its leaves and then returned for the attack. In the 
encounter he was bitten once or twice and on each occasion 
would retire from the encounter to nibble the weed. Just to 
see what it would lead to, the observer stepped forward and 
pulled up the weed. The rattler proved himself more than a 
match for the king snake, inflicting other wounds upon him. 
No longer able to find his weed, the king snake soon retired 
from the encounter and died as a result of the rattler’s venom. 
At the time we thought little of the story, believing that it was 
merely the creation of some person with a high degree of 
imagination, and that the same had been handed down by word 
of mouth from father to son until it came to me. Since then 
we have thought more seriously of it. Ofttimes such myths 
have a genuine foundation if one could but trace them down to 
their origin. 
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