Word: cobras
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...Anon a cobra, no pretty worm of Nilus,* creeps out of nowhere at the feet of that most famed snake charmer of Egypt. It raises its head and a length of body clear of the ground, quite resembling a rat terrier expectantly sitting up for a titbit. As the fakir puffs his cheeks in hissing whistle, the cobra puffs its hood and lazily sways to the sibilancies...
That snake bite poisoning can be counteracted by a horse serum was discovered 25 years ago by Dr. Albert Calmette of the Paris Pasteur Institute. He injected first small doses of cobra venom, then increasingly larger doses into a horse, progressively the horse's blood developed proper antibodies. That horse's serum cured cobra bites-if used promptly, for cobra venom kills very quickly...
...until they smashed its bill so badly that it could not eat and could scarcely breathe. They threw more stones at the sea lion until they blinded one of its eyes. Weirdest of the crimes was the dark attempt of a man to pull a cobra from its glass case by means of a cane and to carry it away in a violin case. Guards saw him; he ran booty-less...
...better to study enigmatic reptile nature, the Sahib kept a cobra under glass, until he found he was losing caste with the natives for imprisoning a god. And throughout his Indian sojourn he learned to understand that reverence for the almighty cobra. One night he was wakened by an unearthly din; his terrified dog crept under the mosquito netting with him. In a pool of moonlight a family of cats fought with a host of rats: danse macabre to the rhythm of warlike squeaks and terrific meows: Then sudden silence. A glistening cobra had glided out of the gloom. Glassy...
...Amaral convinces the incredulous with his experiments. He has injected dogs with deadly cobra venom, then given alcohol to half the animals. The drunken dogs invariably died long before the others...