Some of the poisonous antidotal plants in South America are used in the preparation of the celebrated wourali or curare, with which the Indians poison their arrows. Snake-venom and pounded fangs are also constituents of this, which is why the effect in the blood—as has been shown in experiments—is similar to that of snake-bite. Some of the tribes are said to acquire immunity from the most virulent snakes by swallowing the potent herbs of their region. Inoculation with deadly vegetable juices is another of their remedies; and Tschudi informs us that after this inoculation, snake-bites are harmless for some time, but that the process has to be repeated. Sullivan has not much faith in the process; nor has Dr. Stradling. But there is one undeniable fact connected with the poisonous snakes of most countries, viz. that death by them is comparatively rare; and only in India do we hear of thousands dying annually. Dr. Carpenter, Humboldt, and, I believe, other writers of equal weight, have suggested that the poisonous plants used by native tribes, both internally and externally, may impart to the person an odour which is repugnant to snakes; and if this be the case, how would it be to institute compulsory inoculation among the low-caste Hindoos, who are the chief sufferers in India? Or, could not a few pariah dogs there be inoculated with the juice of some of the native plants, such as the ‘earth gall’ of Malay (Ophiorrhiza mungos), as the Indians of the Orinoco protect themselves with the Vejuco de huaco? Should the process succeed with valueless animals, it might afterwards be attempted in human beings. Perhaps already it has been attempted, and it would be gratifying could I flatter myself that it was through my suggestions of several years ago. Or I may be only betraying my own ignorance of surgery and of the pharmacopeia in suggesting it at all.

There are many popular vegetable ‘antidotes’ of the log cabin and the rough border-clearings of America, but the ‘faculty’ form no high estimate of them. Dr. Weir Mitchel tested some twenty or thirty plants which owe their reputation to Indian traditions, but without success. ‘In the hands of science they failed.’ But then is there not always some delay before the patient can reach the hands of science? It is the prompt treatment, and having the remedies always ready, that may ensure success among the natives. Probably many a bitten person, if alone in the desert, dies, and there are none to record his death. Nevertheless we have good reason for believing that the natives do learn how to manage deadly snakes or to avoid them. In South Africa it is very rare to hear of a person dying of snake-bite; and the natives go bare-footed there as much as in India. Some of the deadliest serpents also are found in Africa. In Australia, where there is a still larger majority of poisonous snakes (more than two-thirds of the whole number), and also bare-footed natives, deaths are comparatively infrequent. Krefft gives us a list which may be of interest to the residents there, viz. the proportions of the venomous to the harmless species of snakes:—

Venomous. Harmless.
New South Wales,21out of30
Victoria, 8”12
South Australia,13”15
West Australia,11”15
Queensland,28”42

Whereas in India, including Ceylon, the venomous families are five to the thirty-five innocuous ones. In India alone Günther describes twenty families of snakes, out of which four only are venomous. When, therefore, we read the annual statistics of India, and the enormous death-rate, which suggest resolutions towards the extermination of snakes, we may again hint that education must join hands with science in order to find remedies. Europeans are seldom bitten; you might count the numbers on your fingers in as many years. Dr. Edward Nicholson has shown that while in twelve years (1860-1871 inclusive) only four British soldiers died from snake-bite, thirty-eight died from the bite of mad dogs; and he thinks it would be more beneficial to the community to kill off some of the hordes of these dangerous animals which infest the country during the summer months. Moreover, that ‘in comparison with preventible diseases and a percentage of the entire population, snake-bites are sensational trifles.’ He thinks the savage crusade against snakes worse than useless, and argues that it would be better to seek remedies for diseases that harm more Europeans in a week than snakes do in a century. Others tell us that the number of deaths is greatly exaggerated, and that many by violence or through fatalism and barbarities are set down to snakes.

But to return to remedies, one would suppose that drugs or plants which kill venomous snakes would be also cures for their bites. It is an old belief that vipers contain in themselves an ‘antidote’ to their venom, and hence the number of popular medicines prepared from their bodies. Conversely, some of the deadly poisons of the pharmacopeia are death to snakes. Aristolochia produces powerful effects on the African vipers; the white ash (Fraxinius Americanus) is an equally rapid poison to the rattlesnake, as Prof. Silliman proved. It is said that these reptiles are never found in the vicinity of this tree. It was the white ash which Oliver Wendell Holmes introduced into his story of ‘Elsie Venner,’ as being destructive to crotalus life, and the novelist wrote from his experience of its effects. Similar cases have been recorded in the Philosophical Transactions. Pennyroyal, says Charas, was held to the nose of a viper, ‘who by turning and wriggling laboured hard to avoid it; and in half an hour’s time was killed by it. This was in July, at which season these creatures are computed to be in the greatest vigour of their poison’ (1657).

Another drug which is poison to a venomous snake is tobacco, within the reach of most persons. This, among native remedies, has always been in favour, and we have heard of its efficacy ever since ‘the weed’ was known to Europeans. Various species of tobacco and its allies are indigenous to most tropical countries, and probably were in use for both man and snake-bites long before civilised nations took such comfort in smoking. In classic ages it was believed that human saliva was fatal to vipers, and it is even affirmed that the Hottentots often kill a puff adder by merely spitting upon it. One must infer from this that their saliva is saturated with some drug which they chew; and from classic authors we might discover that the practice of chewing tobacco, opium, or other drugs obnoxious to snakes, was in use from very early ages. Those classic authors who tell us that human saliva is fatal to snakes had not studied snake nature enough to assign a reason for this, though in all probability a reason did exist. ‘Man carries more poison in his mouth than a snake,’ said an old Virginian writer, alluding to nicotine. ‘He can poison a rattlesnake more quickly than it can him.’ Nicholson states that it also rapidly affects a cobra, and he recommends it, should you wish to destroy the snake uninjured: ‘You have,’ he says, ‘but to blow into its mouth a drop or two of the oil from a dirty tobacco-pipe.’

Two young men chopping wood together in Virginia espied a rattlesnake. With a forked stick one of them held its head close to the ground, keeping its body constrained with his foot, while his comrade took from his own mouth a quid of tobacco, which he forced into that of the snake. The reptile was then released, and had not crawled a couple of yards before it was convulsed, swelling and dying within a short time. Leaves of tobacco as a plaister, or chopped tobacco as a poultice, are applied to a bite by the American backwoodsmen, after the custom of the Indians; or finely chopped tobacco, mixed with moist gunpowder and some pulverized sulphur, formed into a plaister, and laid on the wound, and then set fire to. Tschudi, in his Travels in Peru, p. 434, saw this remedy successfully applied by an Indian to his wife’s bitten foot. A nausea-exciting drug was swallowed at the same time. With the copper-head snake (Ancistrodon contortrix) it is equally efficacious. These and rattlesnakes are said to be never found in tobacco fields.

Strychnine appears to have a similar effect to tobacco on snakes. Fayrer found cobras extremely susceptible to the influence of strychnine. An almost impalpable quantity caused a cobra to ‘twist itself up in a rigid series of coils and die.’

A good many experiments have been tried by a subcutaneous injection of strychnine into dogs and other animals, immediately after being bitten, but without sufficient success to warrant the adoption of it as an infallible remedy. In some of the cases, indeed, the deaths from tetanus suggest the question, ‘Did the cats and dogs die from venom, or from strychnine?’ As virulent poisons are administered in virulent cases, how would it be to swallow strychnine in chemically-prepared doses?

Carbolic acid is another drug which produces powerful effects, causing the reptile to ‘double itself up in numerous folds, remaining as stiff as if cast in metal.’ Creosote, also, snakes hate, Fayrer tells us, and recommends that these two drugs may at least be of use in driving them away from dwellings, as many of them have an objectionably domestic disposition. A few drops of carbolic acid poured on the floor of their cages kill venomous snakes in a very short time. A large Bungarus died in ten minutes in this way.