The daily chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Ind. Ter. [Okla.]) 1898-1902, 1899-02-14
TALK OF SNAKES.
formation ms 10 Her Numerous
0phidian Pets.


Yhe lady who handles the serpent diff
fers from other snake charmers in the
respect that she does not claim to have
developed mysterious affinity for
snakes when she was little girl on her
fathers farm.
She is called Inez Possetti, and the ac-
curate and conscientious "Ballyhoo"
who extols the merits of the show de-
scribes her as "darkeyed senorita
from the Pearl of the Antilles"
ut amt any trick for me to handle
a snake" said the senorita, who doesn't
look bit like Cuban. They can't
hurt me. l am immune. / have been
bitten dozens of times by rattlers, and
other snakes supposed to be deadly.
"All do is to enlarge the wound with
lance and pour ammonia in 1t, am al
most insensible to pain, and things that
would nearly kill another person do not
hurt me. Sometimes the place where a
snake bites me swells a little, but 1t
doesn't hurt much. don't like to be
bitten, and I take pains to avoid it, but
tDey eaten me occasionally.
Our snakes are dying fast. At the
present rate we won't have any left but
chicken snakes and moccasins by
spring. We have only five rattlers left
out of two dozen. Our biggest bull
snakes and our blue racers and our
kings are all dead.
"Canker of the mouth killed them all.
When a snakes mouth gets sore it is al
most impossible to save him. See here,
I'll show you how to tell when a snake
is sick"
The charmer who was seated in the
snake den with about million big
and little reptiles crawling over her,
fished black snake seven feet long out
of the mass, and, holding it firmly by
the head, pried its mouth open with her
fingers.
Squeezing the reptiles jaw so that It
was forced to hold its mouth open the
charmer pointed out that the reptiles
gums were swollen and black, and COW
cred with carkerous growth.
That snake won't live week." she
said. 'I've doctored and doctored him.
but be gets worse every day.
'Now, III show you the mouth Of
healthy snake"
She opened the mouth of chicken
snake, getting bitten as she did so.
plague take the thing!" said the
serorita; then she added reassuringly:
THAT amt anything. Chicken snakes
are not poison. See his gums, how pink
and healthy they are?"
The visitor saw, and promised the
senorita that if he ever had occasion to
buy snake he would examine its
mouth carefully for signs of the deadly
canker.
"What is your favorite snake?"
Senorita Possetti was asked.
Chicken snakes are nice, and so are
moccasins. They are no trouble to feed.
Give a chicken snake bird or a rat
every seven or eight weeks and he'll eat
it and be happy. It's the same with
moccasin, except that he must have
mi. nows and frogs.
"Rattlesnakes are poor feeders.
force mine to eat. l shoot mixture of
milk and eggs down their throats with
a syringe. You can't handle snake
until "a hours after it has been fed. 1t
makes him sick.
"Blue racers are the meanest snakes
when you first get 'em. They are not
poisonous, but they'll bite as hard as
they can. The last one we had stuck his
teeth in my arms dozen times the first
time had him. Finally just let him
chew on me until he got tired. It's fun
ny, but if you let snake bite you until
he gets tired you can't make him bite
you again. He seems to think it's no
use il you don't care.
"The snakes rarely fight each other
unless they are feeding. Then two of
them are apt to get hold of the same
piece of food. Neither will let go, and
the biggest snake swallows the other.
King snakes fight the others, and usual
ly have to be kept in separate box
The blacks and blues are nearly as bad.
1--WE catch our snakes in spring and
summer. If they are not the deadly
varieties, we pick them up with our
naked hands and put them in bag.
The rattlers and other deadly kinds we
catch with forked stick. You can
handle snake in "a hours after he Is
captured. They soon get used to peo-
ple."-St. Louis Post-Dispatch.