El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1897-10-14
A STRANGE DISCOVERY.
The Bile of "a Serpent an Antidote for its
Bite.

Bite.
Another very effective agent for
overcoming the venom of serpents has
been discovered by Professor Thoma 5
r. Fraser, of the university OF Edln-
burgh, saws the New York Tribune.
1t is not whiskey, wherewith Amer
leans anatagonize the poison of rattle
snakes: nor is it NJ. Calmette's an
titoxic serum, obtained from the blood
of animals which have been rendered
immune by successive inocul ations
with small quantities of the venom.
Tie new antidote is nothing more nor
less than the serpent's own bite. In re-
porting series OF elaborate eX-
periments conducted by himself, Prof
essor Fraser recently said:
The bile from the gall bladder of
the Africanu cobra, putf-adder, raft e.
snake and grass snake was used, and
each bile was tested against the venom
of the African and the Indian cobra.
For the first part be experiments were
made by mixing various quantities OF
each bile with a little more than the
min imum fatal dose of the venom, and
then injecting this mixture under the
skin of the animal. The object of the
experiments was not only to determine
| if the bile can render venominnocuous,
but also, il it have this power, what is
the smallest quantity Of bile capable OF
doing it,
Having recounted the various doses
| which he employed, and their effects.
he thus summarizes the result: 1T
was shown that the bile of venOmous
serpents is able, when mixed with the
venom of serpents, 10 prevent lethal
doses of the latter from producing
death. and that the bile IS, indeed, so
powerful an agent in doing this that
| a quantity actually smaller than the
quantity of venom may be sufficient for
the purpose.
at need scarcely be added that the
doses of bile thus shown to be sufficient
| represent only minute portions of the
| bile stored in the gall bladder of a
serpent, and that a serpent, therefore
has at its disposal enough bile to prev
| ent in Jury from venom introduced into
| the stomach in quantities many
times greater than the minimum
lethal.'
The bile of harmless serpents was
also tested and found to be effective.
| though in less degree. The same
secretion from an animal like the OK
was made subject of other experiments
It was even less powerful than the bile
of innocuCus snakes, and about one
seve nth as strong lin its antitoxtc in
| fluence) as the bite of the cobra or asp
But il enough of it were used it would
overcome a fatal dose of the
poison.
DIR. Frazer found that he could isolate
the particular element in a serpent's
| bite which had this surprising proper
| ty, so that the antidote can be prepar-
ed for the market in very compact form
AMI the process of manufacture is
probably quite as simple as, and per-
haps more rapid, than that of Ca met
tie.
Precisely how he obtained his clew
| the Ediu burgh savant does not say.
BIT he Incidentally remarks that some
of the native snake doctors in Africa
have remedy, compounded of several
substances, of which one is snake bile,
and they are accustomed to administer
it not only by introducing it into the
patients stomach where it is probably
without effect, but also by rubbing it
into the wound, where it would be alb
sorbed into the blood. 1t is probable,
therefore, that this wonderful prOvis-
sion of nature, hich compels serpent
to secrete in one rart of its system a
cure for the poison that it secretes in
another, has long been know in some
of those countries where the irfOrma-
ton is most likely to prove beneficial
to mankind.