Not even the ‘pit’ escaped the notice of that nice anatomist,—the ‘nasal fosse,’ or ‘sort of second nostril,’ as it was for a long while called,—and its use conjectured, and which has given to a very large group of venomous serpents the name of ‘pit vipers,’ the peculiar orifice not being confined to the American _Crotalus_ alone (see chap. xxi.). ‘Between the nostrils and eyes are two other orifices which at first I took to be Ears,’ he tells us, speaking of this ‘pit,’ ‘but after found they only led into a Bone that had a pretty large cavity, but no perforation.’ He had seen that vipers—the European vipers which he had previously known—had not these orifices. Then he comments on the great Provision of Nature in furnishing the strong, smooth ‘belly scales,’ (see illustration, p. 193), and the ‘very long trachea of 20 inches. _Nature_ is mightily provident in supplying them with _Air_, in bestowing on them so large a Receptacle for receiving it.’ Tyson quotes from the ‘contests between the noble Italian Redi, and the Frenchman M. Charas,’ as to the source of the poison in vipers, and makes discoveries for himself, as for instance the mobility of the jaw in elevating and depressing the fang, the structure of the teeth, and various other matters which in this book are discussed in their several chapters, but which were then for the first time scientifically described in English by Tyson. True that a little traditional gossip about the rattle, which he had gathered from less competent sources, creeps in towards the conclusion of the paper. While the learned M.D. writes from his own observations and scientific knowledge, he affords valuable information; and we can dispense with the hearsay of the day. However, all honour be to Dr. Tyson of two hundred years ago, who was the first to give us ‘The Anatomy of the Rattlesnake,’ and its first scientific name.