Page:The poisonous snakes of India. For the use of the officials and others residing in the Indian Empire (IA poisonoussnakeso01ewar).pdf/25

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water readily, and swim well, but are essentially terrestrial snakes. They can climb, and occasionally ascend trees in search of food. Cobras are not unfrequently found in the roofs of huts, holes in walls, fowl houses, old ruins, under logs of wood, in cellars, old brick kilns, and old masonry of stone, brickwork, or nud. Such are the conmon dwelling- places of thesc reptiles, and where they are frequently disturbed by men, who, stepping on or inadvertently disturbing and touching them, receive their death-wound.

“The cobra is most deadly, and its poison, when thoroughly inoculated by a fresh and vigorous snake, is quickly fatal. Paralysis of the nerve-centres takes place, and death occurs with great rapidity, some- times in a few minutes, especially when the fings, having penetrated a vein, inoculate the poison immediately into the venous circulation. The number of deaths caused yearly in India by these snakes is perfectly appalling. The cases in which recovery occurs are, it is to be feared, very few; treatment appears to be of little avail unless it be almost immediate, and then, in the case of a genuine bite, there is but little hope of saving life. As to the mode of treatinent and other matters connected with the bite of the cobra, and the great mortality caused by it in India, they will be described subsequently.

"The cobras are the favourites of the snake-charmers, and it is astonishing with what ease and freedom they are seized and handled by these men, cven when in possession of their fangs. The snake-catchers render them temporarily harmless by cutting out the poison fangs; but these are quickly reproduced, unless, as most generally happens, with the fang all the reserve fangs and germs are removed, in which case the snake is harmless for life. Their graceful movements in the erect attitude they assume with the hood distended as they follow the movements of the snake-charmer's hands, niake them an object of wonder as well as fear to all, and the superstitions of the natives about them are endless. The muntra, or spell, is far more potent in their idea than any drug, and to such they generally trust when bitten. How frequently these fail the records of any civil station in India will prove, and it is to be feared that the more material remedies of the physician are scarcely more potent for good.

“The snake-catchers in Bengal describe a great variety of cobras. The