Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-01-02
THOUGH A SNAKE STORY.
This Is Not a Snake Story, In the Usual
Acceptance OF the Term.

This Is Not a Snake Story, In the Usual
Acceptance OF the Term.
People once believed that at Christmas
time ''the bird of dawning" sang all night
long, and no fairy took, nor witch had
power to charm; nights were wholesome, $50
hallowed and SO gracious is the time;" but
the times seem to be badly out of joint at
present.
Snakes are ordinarily associated with
evil things, such as unclean spirits, witches,
etc., and one would suppose that they, too,
would be exercised, but not so this year
On Christmas Day two young men, Philip
and James Douthitt, came across q serpent
in Robinson township, near the Daring
ton & Ewing oil well on the Knopf
farm, Montour Run. Whether his snake
ship had smelled the odor of the blooming
dandelions or was tempted by the wanton
weather to take a stroll, can only be con-
jectured; but it was quite supple and ad-
hered to the mode of locomotion prescribed
in the third chapter OF Genesis as the pen
atty for leading our mother Eve astray.
This snake was of the order vulgarly called
garter. There are some of the copperhead
variety still existing in that locality, but so
far as heard from they didn't celebrate
Christmas.
By the way, speaking of Ewes dalliance
with the serpent, Bsrnum's "great moral
show" suggests to a cynical Cockney the
idea that If Eve had understood snakeoIogy
as well as the lady serpent charmers that
travel with great ''moral aggregations, I"
she might have reversed the opera
ton and led the serpent astray,
and saved her numerous progeny much
trouble. The prophet Isaiah speaks of a
time coming when children shall play on
the dens of the asp and the cockatrice. but
the copperheads of Robinson township
showed no signs last summer of approach to
that millennial spirit, though it may have
been occasioned by a want of confidence on
the part of the people who slaughtered the
reptiles without parley.
1.-THE Oldest inhabitant," who is usually
tenacious in his prerogatIve that allows him
to cap every lusus nature by the relation
of previous experience, lays no claim to
having ever in the olden time seen snakes
out pleasuring in this latitude on Christmas,
not at least outside of his boots, and whether
this garter snake simply took a promenade
to insult a tradition believed BY Shake
speare, or heard the thunder one morning
last week and was deluded into the belief
that the summer of 1890 had come, is proba-
bly, one of the mysteries that never will be
explained to us. Backwoods naturalists say
ophidians are awakened by the first thunder
of spring, and this may be the explanation.
Superstitious people may interpret the mat
ter variously. If they believe with the
Greeks that snakes armed the hand of Dis
cord, they may explain the appearance of
this snake by the discord that has arisen in
the vicinity of Forest Grove Church over
the dancing party lately given. II they be-
lieve with the Egyptians that the serpent is
the emblem of fertility. they may see in this
Christmas visitation promise Of great pros
perity in 1890, and be sure of sympathizers
in their belief.