Page:AJWall Indian Snake Poisons.djvu/70

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45

THEIR NATURE AND EFFECTS.

trace either of permanent nerve injury or of blood poisoning.

The same also occurs in the human subject. I am indebted to Dr. Richards for the following account of a most interesting case which came under his own observation : —

A man named Bamon Das, aged forty years, was bitten by a snake on the shoulder about 3 o'clock in the morning. From his description it was probably the snake termed by the natives of Bengal the "Teutuliah Karís"(a spectacled cobra) about four feet long. He had complained, after the bite, of feeling intoxicated, had vomited, and could neither stand nor speak, though he had continued to be perfectly conscious. At 10 A.M., when Dr. Richards saw him, he was being supported in the sitting posture by two men. Near the posterior border of the deltoid of the left arm were two rather indistinct fang-marks at some considerable distance from each other; one fang-mark, however, more resembled a scratch than a puncture. The arm was painful, hot, and swollen, measuring eleven inches in circumference, whereas the other arm at a similar part measured only nine and a half. On cutting through the punctures the track of the fang was clearly visible, though the staining of the areolar tissue was very slight indeed. He had no power whatever over the eye lids, which had dropped, leaving only the lower parts of the pupils visible. The pupils were perfectly natural,