fro in the beautiful manner peculiar to his kind.  The rat became alarmed and ran near him again.  Again cobra made a dart, and bit him, but did not, I think, inject any poison into him, the rat being so very active; at least, no symptoms of poisoning were shown.  The bite nevertheless aroused the ire of the rat, for he gathered himself for a spring, and measuring his distance, sprang right on to the neck of the cobra, who was waving about in front of him.  This plucky rat, determined to die hard, gave the cobra two or three severe bites in the neck, the snake keeping his body erect all this time, and endeavoring to turn his head round so as to bite the rat who was clinging on like the old man in ‘Sindbad the Sailor.’  Soon, however, cobra changed his tactics.  Tired, possibly, with sustaining the weight of the rat, he lowered his head, and the rat, finding himself again on terra firma, tried to run away:  not so; for the snake, collecting all his force, brought down his erected poison-fangs, making his head tell by its weight in giving vigor to the blow, right on to the body of the rat.

This poor beast now seemed to know that the fight was over and that he was conquered.  He retired to a corner of the cage and began panting violently, endeavoring at the same time to steady his failing strength with his feet.  His eyes were widely dilated, and his mouth open as if gasping for breath.  The cobra stood erect over him, hissing and putting out his tongue as if conscious of victory.  In about three minutes the rat fell quietly on his side and expired; the cobra then moved off and took no further notice of his defunct enemy.  About ten minutes afterward the rat was hooked out of the cage for me to examine.  No external wound could I see anywhere, so I took out my knife and began taking the skin off the rat.  I soon discovered two very minute punctures, like small needle-holes, in the side of the rat, where the fangs of the snake had entered.  The parts between the skin and the flesh, and the flesh itself, appeared as though affected with mortification, even though the wound had not been inflicted above a quarter of an hour, if so much.

Anxious to see if the skin itself was affected, I scraped away the parts on it with my finger-nail.  Finding nothing but the punctures, I threw the rat away and put the knife and skin in my pocket, and started to go away.  I had not walked a hundred yards before all of a sudden I felt just as if somebody had come behind me and struck me a severe blow on the head and neck, and at the same time I experienced a most acute pain and sense of oppression at the chest, as though a hot iron had been run in and a hundred-weight put on the top of it.  I knew instantly, from what I had read, that I was poisoned; I said as much to my friend, a most intelligent gentleman, who happened to be with me, and told him if I fell to give me brandy and “eau de luce,” words which he kept repeating in case he might forget them.  At the same time I enjoined him to keep me going, and not on any account to allow me to lie down.