Immunisation against serpents' venom and the treatment of snake-bite with antivenene / an address delivered by Professor Fraser on Friday, March 20, 1896.

Date:
1896
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Immunisation against serpents' venom and the treatment of snake-bite with antivenene / an address delivered by Professor Fraser on Friday, March 20, 1896. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    account given by Mr. Drummond Hay, and repeated in its main features by Quedenfeldt in the ‘ Zeitschrift fiir Etbnologie ’ of 1886, of the origin of this Eisowy sect, and of tbe immunity which they claim. The founder, Seedna Eiser, was being followed through the desert of Soos by a great multitude, who, becoming hungry, cla- moured for bread. On this, Seedna Eiser became enraged, and turning upon them he uttered a common Arabic curse, “ Kool sim,” which means “ eat poison.” So great was their faith in the teaching of the saint, that they acted upon the literal interpretation of his words, and thereafter ate venomous snakes and reptiles ; and from that time they themselves and their descendants have been immune against serpents’ bites (p. 65). Dr. Honigberger, in his ‘ Thirty-five Years in the East,’ pub- lished in 1852, relates the incident of a faqueer who was bitten by a serpent, and to whom he at once sent medicines which he judged likely to prevent the ill-effects of the venom. “ On the same after- noon,” he writes, “ I visited him and found him in good spirits. I at first attribiited the circumstance to the effect produced by the remedies I had sent him, but was surprised on hearing that he had not taken them, he being of opinion that the venom of the serpent was incapable of affecting him, inasmuch as he had often been bitten by serpents without having sustained any injury.” On the sugges- tion of the faqueer, the same serpent, which had been caught and retained, was allowed to bite him again, and afterwards to bite a fowl. This fowl was taken home by Dr. Honigberger, and he found it dead on the following moiming, “ although the faqueer, who was bitten first, was quite well” (p. 135). Nicholson, in his work on ‘ Indian Snakes ’ (1875), and Eichards, in his ‘ Landmarks of Snake-poison Literature ’ (1885), also narrate instances, the latter with obvious disbelief in their reality, suggest- ing that snake-charmers may possess some means for protecting themselves against the bites of venomous serpents. Many other examples might be quoted in which this suggestion is made. The attention which has been drawn to the subject during the last twelve months has prompted the publication of other instances, such as that related by Dr. Bawa, of a Tamil snake- charmer who, in the course of his performances, was bitten by a cobra without any effect, while an onlooker, foolishly repeating the performance, was bitten by the same cobra, and died in three hours; and the description given by M. D’Abbadie, in a recent issue of the Comptes rendus, of the custom, recently prevailing at Mozambique, of inoculating with serpents’ venom, tmder the firm conviction that pro- tection is thereby produced against the effects of serpents’ bites. It may be instructive to associate with these statements the belief that venomous serpents are themselves protected against the effects of bites inflicted upon them by individuals both of their own and of other species. On mere anatomical grounds, it is difficult to understand how serpents could escape the absorption of their own