The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-10-26
Man Sheds Skin Like Snake

FROM the 9enNeT
Florence, Ore.-Luther King, known as
"Rattlesnake King" who is slowly dying
here does not believe that he will live
till August, and that at last there will
be an end of his affliction, which he
terms .the serpents brand that the Bible
speaks about"
Recently the Evangelical church of
Florence prayed in body for the old
man.
In the early part of August, 1875. IS
years ago, Luther King was picking
blackberries in the mountains of Idaho
when rattlesnake, disturbed in its sleep,
struck quickly and without warning his
leg little below the knee, and he
dragged 1t as he ran, whipping and jerk
ing. for 200 yards or more.
He reached camp all right, the poison
was extracted from the bite, the wound
healed in a few weeks, and probably, as
he believes, all the subsequent history of
the bite, the suffering it caused and its
strange, almost incredible manifestations
would not have occurred had it not been
for one circumstance-the time of the
year. August, as Is well known, is dog
days and during this month snakes shed,
are blind, and they strike at erything
they hear. 1t was the bite of blind and
shedding snake that brought dog days
and recurrent death into the life of
Luther King.
For 20 years he was we'll and sound,
the snake bite was practically forgotten
| Then on the last day OF July 1885, he
felt peculiar irritation on the bitten
leg, but on the instep and not just be-
! low the knee, where appeared the faint
scar of the bite. The next morning, Au-
gust l, he woke up feeling dizzy and to
find that the Irritating spot on his instep
was sore. All that month he slept from,
| is to 20 hours day, drank little and ate
ha Of
the body stopped. On the first of Sep
tember he got out of bed and called for
something to eat BY September the
sore was completely healed.
On the last day of July the next year
! he felt again an itching on his instep
two itchings, and at the same time he
felt dizzy as with malaria. The next
morning the year-old scar upon his In
| step had revived into a sore, and only two
inches away was another sore. Again he
/ slept the whole month through with TT
tle/ drink or food and imagining in his
delirium that rattlesnake was co'ed up
! on his leg under the skin. On the first
day of September he got up hungry. BY
| September the sores We're well.
And so each year for Is years, with in
exp'icable regularity, on August l. his
state Of coma and fasting has begun, all
! the scars of the preceding year have re-
vlved, accompanied unfailingly by a new
the sores have never failed TO be entire
ly healed by September L. He now has
IS scars upon his leg. That first sore
| upon his ipstep. like a periodical vo'-
cano. has revived IS times, the second II
times. and thus it became simple prob
/ lem in progression to find that Luther
King, bitten once by live rattesnalee
has been rebitten III times by an invis-
| 'ble and ghostly snake that all through
each August lies coiled there.
! 1t seems, indeed. as he believes and as
J serts that preternatural correspond
/ ence is being worked out between his life
and the life of the snake that bit him
| I'm just like a snake In August he
| says. II shed then The skin comes
right off my leg; | can just strip it right
! off. / don't eat nothin and / sleep all
the time. And I'm pizen like rattle
! snake then. If I'd bite you in August
| I'd kill you. He has always thought
| that when the sores reach the number Of
! the snakes rattles they would stop in
creass1g and stop reviving, and although
! he knows nothing of the size of the
| snake except that it was very large
! he has been waiting hopeessly each year,
thinking the ''rattles had at least been
counted" :"