A Mr. John Clayton, in an _Account of the Beasts in Virginia_, 1694, tells us the rattlesnake’s ‘Tayle is composed of perished Joynts like a dry Husk. The Old shake and shiver these Rattles with wonderful Nimbleness; the Snake is a Majestick sort of Creature, and will scarce meddle with anything unless provoked.’ He also describes the ‘fistulous Teeth’ and the poison being injected through these ‘into the very mass of the blood.’ Effective remedies are spoken of, as if not much doubt of a cure existed. An Indian was bitten in the arm, who ‘clapt a hot burning coal thereon and singed it stoutly.’ In Italy experiments still went on, and a Mr. C. J. Sprengle wrote to the Royal Society from Milan (1722), that in a room opened at the top were sixty vipers from all parts of Italy. ‘Whereupon we catch’d some mice and threw them in, one at a time, among all that number of vipers; but not one concerned himself about the mice, only one pregnant viper who interchanged eyes with the mouse, which took a turn or two, giving now and then a squeak, and then ran with great swiftness into the chops of the viper, where it gradually sunk down the gullet.’ And from this sinister proceeding on the part of the viper, Mr. Sprengle argues a fact generally borne out in zoological collections ever since, namely, that venomous snakes in captivity will not eat until they become reconciled. And so by degrees these many interesting ophiological facts have been worked out and established. In 1733, vol. xxxviii., some experiments made by Sir Hans Sloane are recorded. A dog was made to tread on a rattlesnake which bit him. In one minute of time the dog was paralytic in the hinder legs, and was dead in less than three minutes. Another subject of subsequent interest and even importance was some observations made by Sir Hans Sloane on the ‘Charms, Inchantments, or Fascinations of Snakes,’ in reply to communications by Paul Dudley, Esq., F.R.S., and Col. Beverley, both of whom believed that the rattlesnake could bring a bird or a squirrel from a tree into their mouths by the power of their eye. A word on fascination will come in its place, but as a part of rattlesnake history Sir Hans Sloane may be quoted here. And yet a reason so long ago suggested by him, who _thoughtfully_ watched a snake, seems almost entirely to have escaped notice. He thinks ‘the whole mystery of charming or enchanting any Creature is simply this. Small Animals or Birds bitten, the poison allows them time to run a little way (as perhaps a bird to fly up into a tree), where the snakes watch them with great earnestness, till they fall down, when the snakes swallow them.’[79]