Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 April 1890 — THE COBRA. [ARTICLE]

THE COBRA.

Indian and Chinese Superstitions About t the Venomous Snake. Some very interesting facts have been brought to general notice on the alleged avenging habit of the cobra In India and Chinese folk lore. The belief in India is that a wounded cobra which escapes will sooner or later revenge itself on the man who has ■caused the injury, wherever he may go or whatever he may do. This belief is also deeply rooted in Indo<China and China itself as well as in India. In China there is also a strongprejudice against killing a cobra, lest its spirit should haunt the slayer ever after. In that country cobras are, therefore, shunned rather than pursued and attacked. Popular stories of the dire consequences of slaying them keep up the superstition A high official who had killed one died soon afterward of some mysterious disease, and the death was. of course, attributed to the slain snakes The spirit of the snake is. furthermore, supposed to enter into possession of it, slayer and employ the vocal organs of the latter in uttering impreeatiois on himself until death mercifully ivmo vcs

The marvel is that any snakes at all are killed in China, so many dreadful punishments are supposed to overtake their destroyers, and it is considered a work well meriting favor, here and hereafter, to purchase captured snakes and liberate them. Nevertheless, poisonous snakes are not numerous in China, probably because their presence is inconvenient to Chinese farmers, and they are therefore destroyed, folk lore notwithstanding.