Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 February 1904 — POISON OF THE RATTLER. [ARTICLE]

POISON OF THE RATTLER.

>•1 Nratlr M D**c«r««i m It la PoaaUtlr IwMMt «• B*. "There la a good* deal more fright •bout the bite of a rattleannke than there la actual danger.” aald a well known physician recently. “I do not mean to say that the bite of a rattler la not a very serious thing, but I do mean to say that this particular aort of snake la really not so ready or apt to 'get in his bite' os some others. “In the first place, there is the now generally credited fact that the rattler Is the most honest of snakes. He doesn’t ‘pick a fight.’ He doesn’t lay In wait for any one. He won’t run •way, of course, for he is a plucky reptile, but he will curl up and give you a fair warning from those rattles of his before he attempts to strike. I remember once in the west finding a rattler just ahead of my horse’s fore feet. I had no weapon of any sort, so I rode on, passing within a few Inches of the reptile. The snake was curled and ready for my horse In case the animal side stepped, but as we did nothing of that sort we were allowed to pass In peace. "Again, the truth is that the poison of the rattler does not get into the wound inflicted by the fangs in the average human being. For the average human being nowadays js clothed, and the holes in the fangs through which the poison comes are rather far up toward the roof of the mouth. Consequently very often the point of the fangs may enter the skin, while the poison dribbles out harmlessly enough upon the trousers or the boot It is then that the ‘victim’ gets scared, fills up on whisky—a bad thing in bona fide cases of rattlesnake bite—and believes himself marvelously cured when he wakes up next day."—Philadelphia Press.