Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1882-06-30
Snake Charmers.

| Some years ago, when Cairo was thu
Cairo of the "Arabian Nights" and not
the disreputable looking second-ratel
French country town it is now, we inqulr-
ed for any possible successor to the old
snake charmer whom old Anglo-Indians
may remember to have seen playing with
his cobras before Shepherds Hotel CWas
he not at the Zoolin the wonderful year
| 1851, and did he not promptly decline.
without thanks, our offer of two or three
lively capellos then in the collecticn?) AT
ter some trouble we lighted on the furtlve
Arab caitiff. in the usual long blue shirt,
girded about the waistto form the upper
part into species of spleuchan or sporan.
In this he seems to keep his dirty pipe, his
packet of frousty tobacco, and whatever
small portable property he had acquired
more er;lessshnnestly With him we resort
ed to divers ancient stahlessand out-huild-
ings in the suburbs, and cobjured him to
find snake. Placing small wooden pipe,
between his lips he tootled quantity an old
Arab air, now low, but hardly soft, and
now high and loud, Thus he wandered,
tootling and furtive, and we following
old half dark, evil-smelling stable he ap-
peared to get excited; gave vent to still
wilder squeaks and squalls, circled round
and round under big palm tree beam,
and at last. with an ear-splitting note, he
squatted suddenly down, dashed his hand
apparently upward, and clutched big
cobra, which he evidently intended us to
believe had been charmed from above. l
say apparently. for I am certain that he
lost the brute out of the ''bosom" of his
blouse. Now this was very pretty, but
hardly satisfactory so instead of giving
our charmer ''backsheesh" (having man
in authority among us,) we promised him
bastinado if he did not capture snake in
the open Very limp about the loins and very
yellow did that Arab caitiff show through
his brown kin. but we were relentless
"Cobro or Tobo - and so he searched with
the greatest care-not TO find what, in
fact he did not want to find. At last one
of us spied the tail of a good-sized snake
''Now, my friend, catch US that snake, or"
He tootled not-the ''or' had taken the
music out of him-and, overcoming with
visible effort his shuddering horror, he
caught the tail in one hand and rapidly
ran the other up the body till he reached
the neck. Pinning this between his finger
and thumb, he caught up the tail of his
blouse, and forcing the brute to close his
jaws upon it. tore it out rapidly again and
again evidently with the intention of tear
ing out the poison fangs, which he did at
IA t., to certain extent. to his own salts
faction; but he was wary to the end, and
instead of putting it into his pouch with
his old friend. he knotted it up in a rag
And SO he went his way and we went ours,
with gentle feallng that it we had been
done we were to a certain extent aware
of the fact. By che way, unless my mem
ory has utterly given way to my magma
tion, distinctly remember seeing in 1851
the cobra striking and drawing blood from
the arms of the old Arab snake-charmer
and his clever boy. Many wonderful
things he did, such as producing cata-
leptic rigidity in the snake, as easily re-
moved as roduced-things | should like
to see again.-7he London Field.