From Chambers' Journal. on the subject. Rats and jackals are considered dainties; and an animal having died Ir is wonderful how many popular delu- from disease, instead of unfitting it for food, sions exist about snakes, what marvellous only gives it additional piquancy in their stories are told of them, and how readily eyes. I never saw them engaged in any inthey find believers. dustrial employment except making ropes, It is generally supposed that they have which, besides juggling and snake-charming, such a taste for music as to leave their hiding-forms their ostensible means of livelihood. places at the sound of the snake-charmer's They are not averse, however, to increase uncouth instrument; that they like a warm their private resources by thieving, or any berth, and are in the habit of ensconcing other roguery when opportunity offers. themselves under a pillow or part of a lady's Their women are strapping Amazons, with dress; that they are partial to milk, a small high voices and low morals. On one occaportion of which placed near is sufficient to sion, marching in command of a small detachallure them from the most desirable resting- ment, I found, on arriving at the only enplace; and that there is some herb an in- camping-ground for some miles, that it was fallible remedy for their bite, only known to occupied by a party of these people. I sent their inveterate enemy, the mungoose, who for the head man, and was surprised at a cures himself with it when wounded in one woman making her appearance instead. of those encounters which occur so frequently Knowing their thievish propensities, I polite between them. The fallacy of this last has ly told the lady the ground was only large been satisfactorily proved by trying the ex- enough for one camp; whereon she coolly periment of shutting up a mungoose and a observed, that if such was the case, I had poisonous snake in the same room. After better move on and leave them the place to some delay, the mungoose killed the snake, themselves. I gave a categorical rejoinder and appeared none the worse for it. Now, as it is improbable that the animal kept any of the concentrated essence of this wonderful herb about him, and as he certainly could not go abroad to seek it, we can only conclude that he possessed dexterity enough to avoid the bite of his antagonist, and thus came off scathless and victorious. -first, that the ground had been cleared by the sircar (government) for their own troops; secondly, that I had orders to halt there that day, and meant to obey them; and thirdly and lastly, that if they did not clear out bag and baggage instanter, I would save them the trouble, and deposit their traps in the adjacent nullah. The fair charmer retired; As to their fondness for quartering them- but, while doing so, she hurled at me her selves in warm localities, it is only in an un- Parthian arrows in the form of evil wishes congenial climate that they nestle in blankets and abusive epithets. The virago never or betake themselves to other such unwonted once paused for breath, or hesitated for a luxuries. In their own country, they prefer word, but poured forth an uninterrupted a tuft of moist grass or a ruined building. volley of slang, compared with which the When they pay you a domestic visit, they choicest Billingsgate would seem a compliseem to like the bathing-room with its cool mentary address. Seeing that resistance jars, better than any other part of the house, was useless, however, she called the other and are fond of lounging behind any door women; they caught and accoutred their which is rarely opened, or in a box placed half-starved, vicious-looking tattoos, struck near the wall; or, in fact, in any place that tents, packed up everything, and then is quiet, cool, and dark. The statement that mounted their steeds en cavalier. During music is relished by the snake-tribe has this scene, the men sat and smoked, seeming obtained general belief; yet I feel convinced to regard their proceedings as a matter of that it is greatly exaggerated, if not wholly course, and rendering no assistance whatuntrue. As to the snake-charmers capturing ever. As soon as the party were in marchthem by means of music-if such a term ing-order, the pipes were transferred to the can be applied to the abominably discordant fair equestrians, and the men trudged on, sounds they produce with equal truth leaving them to follow at leisure, which they might it be said that Mr. Anderson's magic-did-alternately smoking and scolding, unwand produces the startling effects we wit-til the jungle hid them from us. ness in his exhibitions, or that "hocus The men alone practice the snake-charm- . pocus or hey presto" possess miraculous powers when uttered by certain individuals. The whole thing is a delusion. The snake-charmers of India are a very low caste, who lead a vagabond life, and eat whatever they can obtain with least trouble, totally disregarding conventional prejudices ing trick, and are generally tall, loose-limbed, hard-featured fellows, dressed in coarse salmon-colored garments. They go about cantonments playing on their singularly unmusical instrument, which emits a sound something like what boys make out of oatstems, called a jokawn in Ireland, only twice The different varieties of snakes are almost innumerable. In our Hindustanee dictionary, I find forty-five different words signifying serpent or snake, and of course many must be omitted in a work of the kind, from which some idea way be formed of the great number of different species that exist. Of these, the greater number are altogether innocuous; others, slightly poisonous-that is to say, their bite would be attended with some pain and inflammation, but not fatal consequences, except to the smaller class of animals. Comparatively few species are deadly, of which the most common are the cobro da capello and the karait; the latter is beautifully marked with black and brown spots, and seldom exceeds twenty inches or two feet in length; but its small size only adds to the danger, by rendering it so difficult to be seen. Some people assert that no bite would prove fatal if the proper remedies were applied immediately. as harsh, and ten times as loud. I was sit- what we wanted-namely, satisfied ourselves ting one morning in the veranda of a friend's on the subject, we dismissed him with a handbungalow, when one of those men, attended ful of pice, no way abashed at the detection by a boy, came up, and after making salam, of his imposture. requested permission to try his skill in discovering snakes in the compound. My friend told him that he had been several months residing there, and had never seen one; however, at the earnest request of some ladies lately arrived from England, the man was told to try if he could find any. Making another salam, he started off, and began playing and strolling about the compound, stopping occasionally as if to look about him. After a short time he returned, saying he felt sure a snake was in or near the sheephouse. This was exactly in the opposite direction from the spot which he had set out, and thither we all went in a body. The house was quite empty, all the sheep being out grazing, and we followed the snakecharmer in, who moved about inside as if uncertain which way to turn. He then ceased playing, and addressed the snake-tribe, calling them his father and mother, the light of his life, the patrons of his caste; that he would never hurt them, or let any The most successful treatment seems to be one else do so; he would only keep them sucking and cleansing the wound at once, three days, feed them well, and then release administering repeated doses of eau de luce, them far away in the jungle. This farce or if that is not at hand, brandy or other continued for a while, when he stopped stimulants; also keeping the patient in conopposite a small hole in the mud-wall about stant exercise, and preventing his giving way the size of a shilling, in which he inserted his finger, and pulling out a piece of the mud, disclosed a snake about two feet long coiled up inside. This he took out and handled, tied it round his neck, and let it bite his hand, pretending it gave him great pain. The man produced a blue bag, into which the snake glided as if accustomed to it. This, and there being no marks of bites on the man's hands, confirmed me in the belief that the snake was a tame one, and I told him so; which he denied indignantly, saying it was very poisonous, and begged for a small present and his dismissal. This we refused, saying we would first test his truth by letting the snake bite a fowl; and if it died in a short time, he should get what he asked; otherwise, we would kill the snake, and thrust him out as an imposter. In vain he protested- we were inexorable; the fowl was brought, and we told him to proceed; when, finding there was no other resource, he made a clean breast of it, confessed that the snake was a tame one with the fangs extracted, and that it had been placed in the sheep-house by his boy whilst he was pretending to look in another direction; and finally begged us not to deprive a poor man of the means of earning his bread, by destroying the snake. As we had obtained to the drowsiness which always comes on as soon as the virus has had time to circulate in the system. The natives have many remedies, some of which appear very absurd; but they answer the required purpose, as very few deaths occur amongst them from this cause. The most popular cure is the " zuhur mohra,' or poison antidote. It is a small stone, resembling in size and appearance that infantine luxury called a bull's-eye" after it has been held for some time in the hand of a dirty child. It is stated to be found in the stomach of a toad, and brought from the neighborhood of Bokhara. Perhaps, had Shakspeare ever heard an inkling of this, he would have made a change in his simile for adversity, and placed the precious jewel," which "the toad, ugly and venomous, wears" in another part of his body. I saw the zuhar mohra tried once by a bheestee, who was bitten in the great toe. The stone was merely moistened in water, and bound on the foot, a little above the wound, by a strip of linen. I laughed at the remedy, and offered the man eau de luce, which he refused. Next day, however, he was as well as ever; so we must conclude that either the snake was not poisonous, or that there is more in the antidote than one would suppose. On another occasion, I saw my gardener bitten in the heel by a scorpion: went through the window, and another the pain was so intense that the man dropped killed a pet bantam. Again he approached as if shot. The only remedy he used was the hole, and again I jerked him back as beforming a circle round the instep with but- fore. The confounded servants either could ter-milk and chunam, and getting a Brahmin not or would not hear me; and as he drew to bless it. This occurred in the evening, about near his hole for the third time, I prepared sunset; and next morning at gun-fire, the to repeat my former experiment, but the rasman was working in the garden, none the cal had grown too knowing for me this time; worse for the sting. Had a European re- he deliberately turned round and entered the ceived the same injury, and treated it secun- hole tail-foremost - not only this, but he dum artem, he would probably have been laid had the impudence to stick out his tongue up for a week. at me just before his head disappeared!' The Hindoos relate countless anecdotes and traditions of snakes. One species, called the dhamin, which is nearly black, and grows to eight or nine feet long, is said to be poisonous only on Sunday. Another kind is supposed to attack none but women: probably its antecedent in the metempsychosis was a disappointed lover, who thus revenges himself on the sex. -N. B. Both kinds are perfectly harmless. Vishnu, the second person of the Hindoo Trinity, is said to repose on an enormous serpent, the fortunate possessor of a thousand heads, one of which supports the world. One holiday is set apart for the worship of serpents, an immense number of which inhabit the regions under the earth in company with some congenial souls in the shape of hydras and dragons. The sun never shines there, but it is lit up with innumerable precious stones of great value and brilliancy. That marvellous stories of these reptiles are not confined to natives alone, the following anecdote will testify, which was narrated by a gallantand veracious field-officer, known in the far East by the sobriquet of Colonel Liebig: "I was walking in my veranda one evening when I observed a snake gliding along the walk and making for his hole in the opposite bank. I looked about for a switch or whip, but nothing of the kind was within reach. A moment more, and he would have escaped, when, actuated by a sudden impulse, I seized him by the tail just as he was entering his hole. and threw him back several yards, shouting to the servants to bring a stick to dispatch him. They were deaf or stupid; not a soul appeared to hear me. The snake picked himself up, and began wriggling back towards his domicile. Growing excited, I seized a couple of stones, and pelted them at him; both shots told, for one Our readers will perceive by this true story that the serpent has lost none of the subtlety he possessed in olden times; they may, however, rely upon it, that if they ever meet one, he will be quite as anxious to part company as themselves. There may be fear, but there can be no danger unless you tread on the reptile, or otherwise injure it. The best way to destroy it is to get quietly alongside, and give it a smart tap on the back with a riding-whip or pliant switch -a very slight blow will dislocate the vertebra, and then the enemy is at your mercy. Many, however, escape, owing to the objection all highcaste Hindoos have to killing them; particularly if they have bitten any one, as they consider that killing the snake in that case signs the death-warrant of the person bitten. To such an extent does this prejudice go, that I once saw a petition sent into the magistrate's court by a Hindoo widow, who accused a certain Mussulman trooper of having caused the death of her husband, by killing a snake immediately after it had bitten the deceased. It is needless to say that the magistrate's verdict was: "Sarved him right." That the snake may be lured from his hole by placing a vessel of milk near the spot cannot be true; as, when living in a country where these reptiles abounded, I never found one near where milk was usually kept; and even had it been otherwise, I would have acquitted him of thievish intentions, as the truth is, the ophidia never drink. I have thus endeavored to confute some of the false stories commonly told and believed about the genus Coluber, who are, I consider, in many respects a much vilified and misrepresented race. In olden times they were better known and appreciated, when the serpent was the companion of Esculapius and the emblem of convalescence. 1 LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 634.-19 JULY, 1856. 5. Sacred Latin Poetry, chiefly Lyrical; with Notes and Introduction by R. C. Trench, M. A. London 1849. 6. Hymns from the Land of Luther. First Šeries, 1854. Second Series, 1855. Edinburgh: Kennedy. 7. Lyra Germanica: Hymns for the Sundays and chief Festivals of the Christian Year. Translated from the German by Catherine Winkworth. Second Edition. Longmans: 1855. 8. Psalms and Hymns for the Sanctuary, Family Altar, and Closet: selected by the Rev. J. C. Miller, M. A. Ninth Edition. Birmingham: 1855. 9. A Hymnal for use in the English Church. London: Mozley. 1855. striving evermore to rise up to Him. The anthem is swelled sometimes by the grand chant of the thunder-psalm, and sometimes by the sweet warble of the birds; it is borne upwards sometimes on the wings of the wind, and sometimes on the breath of the flowers. All this is ineffably glorious, and yet all this unconscious thanksgiving is as nothing compared with the free anthems of the sons of God; for these are the loftiest privileges to which the soul's worship can aspire - the noblest utterances which creation knows. They began when first the morning stars leapt to light from the bosom of Jehovah they rang through the aisles of the everlasting temple, for untold ages before the world was peopled- the echo was caught by our Paradisal parents in the glory of their sinlessness - but when they fell it changed: a new voice was thenceforth heard rising up before the crystal sea, the voice of praise mingled with prayer, and only accepted through an intercessor. Hitherto no prayer had been needed; every voice which had PRAISE is co-extensive with creation: illim-flowed forth to God had been like the voice itable in space as it is illimitable in time, it of the angels now -the simple thanksgiving goes up to God for evermore from every king- of children lying trustfully on His breast, dom of His universe. The chorus is as infi- with no consciousness of fault or want, and nite in variety as it is infinite in strength: in therefore no need of prayer. But when Eden> the abysmal ocean, which the Thought of was tenantless its sinless praises ceased; the God alone can fathom, deep answering unto worship of God's Church then first began, deep peals forth its homage-and yet He and for four thousand years rose up in varyhears the whispers of the jubilant breeze, He ing cadence to the glory of the Creator and is pleased with the incense-perfume of the the Guardian. The song ascended at one time flowers. Innumerable seraphim, bathing in from a few tents on the sands of Arabia, and His light, chant His glory, while they who at another from the thousand vales of Pales"mount up with wings as eagles "hover tine-at one time from Israel in the wilderround His throne in pauseless and endless ness, and at another from Israel in her insymphony. The echo of the music of the heritance. The tide of psalmody surged and firmament reverberates eternally from a heaved in the full swell of the antiphons in myriad starry worlds; the pulse of time the temple, and then died away again until itself, as it throbs in the alternations of day it blended with the murmur of Babylonian and night, is but a monotone of praise. rivers. At one time, as though the wings On earth the flood of melody streams of some blind angel were caught in the forth untiringly from all that is beautiful or strings," the music fluttered on the lyre of grand; the sun is ever somewhere reddening the royal Psalmist; at another, it streamed into matin brightness and matin thanks- forth from the lips of him who, like the giving; the sea speaks ceaselessly of its apostles in aftertime, had been touched with Maker as its waves spend their strength in the altar-flame of Heaven. Then came fitful: DCXXXIV. LIVING AGE. VOL. XIV. 9 gusts, and mournful lamentations- the hymn losophers, of bishops and confessors without of praise was mingled with the wail of a per-end, each summing up into some few but secuted people, but it still told its tale amid strong doxologies the holiest thoughts of a desert-caves and concealed proseuchas, never lifetime; it has pressed into its service the sinking quite to sleep until the time for a grandest minds which the world has seen, change was come. and yet not scorned the lowliest; it has set. For another change had long been dawn- before men the noblest work and the noblest ing: the Church's thanksgiving had hitherto theme in the universe, receiving in return the been wholly rendered to God the Creator and utterances of the soul's yearning to grasp it; God the Preserver, but this was not to con- it has developed fully the power which lies in tinue forever. Her praise for creation was to words of kindling our best affections and be supplanted by her praise for redemption; rousing us to superhuman energy; it has her song for delivery from fleshly foes was to be spoken now in a thunder-peal and now in a whelmed in her song of triumph over the em- low thrill of delicious melody-now in the battled powers of darkness; her joys and hopes cathedral aisle, and now in the convent chapel on earth, her thanks and jubilees in heaven, - now in the monarch's palace,* and now were all to reflect the new phase under which at the martyr's stake; it has swelled and God had shown himself to His people they rolled in a limitless and fathomless flood from were to be penetrated with one absorbing thought, the thought of God the Redeemer. And the aspect which praise then took is one which it shall never lose; it has indeed paled and brightened ever since with the varying intensity of the Christian life, but in the changeless now which shall make up eternity, a tideless ocean of heavenly music shall bear upon its breast the Church's unwavering alleluias to the Lord the Saviour. the days of Pentecost until now; it has shone with a myriad lights through the darkness of the darkest centuries, never ceasing to place new lamps before the altar for the illumination of the Church and for the glory of the Redeemer. And what has been the effect of the grand aggregate of sacred song which has been thus gathered from every corner of Christendom during so many ages of time? The answer comes to us, wafted above the battle-din of centuries, from the palm-groves of ancient Syria, where the persecuted faithful wandered for days and nights with hymns as their only solace; † it comes to us from the catacombs of Rome, where martyr after martyr was laid in the tomb while the chanted requiem gave strength and hope to the survivors; it comes to us from the multitudinous masses of Constantinople, met together to preface Chrysostom's homilies with Chrysostom's seraphic "Te Deum;" it comes to us from the valley of the Nile, where anchorites and monks without number ceased not, day nor night, to send up to heaven their incensefumes of holy song; it comes to us from Such thanksgiving needed a fitting prelude: the anthem which was for evermore to tinge the melody of the seraphim--though they might not utter it-required an unearthly intonation. And so it was: the symphony of the first creation had begun with the chantings of the morning stars-the hymn of the new creation was ushered in by an innumerable chorus of angels, whose raiment of flashing whiteness changed night to noon, as they filled the air with that magnificent proclamation, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men." Saints, martyrs, and apostles have taken up the strain; they have bridged the lapse of time by a pathway of holy hymns, which stretches over the ages, like the galaxy over the churches of Italy-surrounded time after the firmament, that the sons of God may commune together on earth as they do in heaven. The loftiest aspirations which human lips have ever breathed, the most glorious imaginings which human thought has ever pictured, have had their rise in the effort at adoration. Christian hymnology has furnished a treasure-house into which the soul's best gifts have been freely poured; it has received the contributions of kings and phi time by Arian soldiery who strove in vain with clashing arms and sounding trumpets to drown the anthems of the worshippers; || it 22. See the account of Theodosius. Socr. Eccl. Hist. vii. † See the history of Flavian and Diodorus. Theodos. Eccl. Hist. li. Bunsen's Christianity and Mankind. Vol. VII. ham, Orig. Eccl. xiv. (Works, vol. v. p. 7. Edid. Rev. Cf. Cassian Institut. lib. ii. cap. 2. Quoted in Bing. R. Bingham: Oxford, 1855.) Cr. Athanas. Apol. ii. p. 717. Ambros. Ep. 33 (al, 20) ad Marcell. |