INTRODUCTION, 
THE absence of a general work on the important forms of animal 
life peculiar to Australasia led to the publication of this manual. 
‘Lhe fauna is not so well known as the flora. Not only was the field 
unoccupied, there were also inquiries in parliament, in the press, and 
in other places, for information on the poisonous snakes so dangerous 
to human life: for this reason ophidians have been made a specialty. 
During the last forty years men unskilled and skilled have sought 
for a specific to neutralize those few drops of lethal fluid, which the 
lurking reptile injects into its victim. The empiric, encinctured 
with snakes like the priest of Troy, proffered his mystic bottle for 
sale, while giving proofs of the efhcacy of the lotion on his punctured 
arm, ‘The professor experimented on the canine tribe in his well- 
equipped laboratory at the university, and published the results of 
his investigations for the benefit of humanity. The doctor, in his 
home and on his professional rounds among the ‘‘ beautiful Aus- 
tralian Alps,” pondered for an antagonist of snakebite, which he 
unluckily had suffered almost unto death. A snake gave him the 
first lesson, but a quarter of a century had passed away before the 
problem was wrought out ; it was done silently without an elaborate 
course of experiments on animals. ‘Two Australian Governors have 
brought his remedy under the notice of the Viceroy of India, and 
Her Majesty has promised to have a course of experiments with it 
performed in that portion of her empire. In the meantime a native 
doctor is successfully employing it. The antidotes furnished suc- 
cessive y were the nostrum of the quack, the ammonia of the 
rofessor, the strychnine of the physician, and, ammonia having 
_ been abandoned, the chloride of lime of the professor. Snake- 
charmers have appeared upon the scene and perished with their 
** nets” close at hand ; uHdereood in Victoria many years ago was 
the first member of the series ; West at Grenfell, New South Wales, 
June, 1893, another. He had been to Lake Cowal, where he pro- 
cured seven tiger snakes, one of which escaped from his bag and bit 
him in the back. Hullar was bitten during a performance with a 
tiger snake at Echuca and died, May, 1893; a female snake-charmer 
averted a similar fate by the immediate use of ammonia. Nor have 
their audiences experienced complete immunity, a magistrate in 
Melbourne bitten in public by a tiger snake at an exhibition suc- 
cumbed, notwithstanding the best medical aid. The antidotes 
already discovered in Victoria have saved many sufferers from the 
effects of snakebite, some of whom were almost in articulo mortis, 
but a specific has not yet been found that will cope with every 
variety and condition of subtle ophidian virus. 
