Cobra

“ The snake charmer usually plays a few simple notes on the flute, and the cobra, apparently delighted, rears half its length in the air and sways its head and body about, keeping time to the music.
The cobra, like almost all poisonous snakes, is by no means aggressive, and when it gets timely warning of the approach of man endeavours to get out of his way. It is only when trampled upon inadvertently, or otherwise irritated, that it attempts to use its fangs. ”

“ Well, on this afternoon, a big, silky tiger came walking down the lane. Suddenly, when he was just about opposite us, he stopped short—like this statue—his head down. He stared at something. We followed his shining eyes. A cobra had slipped out of the box in which the chap kept his snakes. The tiger stared as if paralyzed, fascinated, a yard from the snake's head. A cobra! That's the wrong kind of a girl—a cobra. Mind you, this tiger could have killed the thing with one blow of his paw. He could have killed a lion, or scattered a regiment. ”

“ A cobra was fed on rabbits. We children haunted that tent at feeding-times, and used to watch with fascination the little dead bunnies disappearing, fur and all, afterwards noticing with glee the strange bumps they formed in the animal's smooth and shiny coils. How bloodthirsty children are at heart! ”

“ Far more deadly is the bite of the cobra, which is found plentifully in India. Any one who is bitten by this formidable snake is almost sure to die within two or three hours.
The upper part of a cobra's neck is widened out into what is called the hood, which can be spread out or folded up at will by the action of the ribs. On the upper part of this hood is a dark mark, which looks almost exactly like a pair of spectacles. When a cobra is about to strike it always raises its head and neck and spreads this hood before darting at its foe. ”

“ At the top of the hill is a deep shadowy rock-pool, with a brow of cliff overhanging it; and this is named the Cobra’s Bath, for it is believed that in the past there was a cobra who used, with his outspread hood, to shelter the saint, Mahinda, from the torrid sun, and who was also so much a little servant of the Law that none feared and all mourned him when he passed upon his upward way in the chain of existences. ”

“ The cobra being thus an object of worship, it is a deadly sin to kill or maim it. For the cobra is in the popular imagination a Brāhman, and there is no greater sin than that of killing a Brāhman. Accordingly, if any one kills a cobra, he is sure to contract leprosy, which is the peculiar punishment of those who have either killed a cobra, or have led to the destruction of its eggs by digging in or ploughing up soil which it haunts, or setting on fire jungle or grass in the midst of which it is known to live and breed.
Praying for Offspring before Lingam, Snake-Stones, and Figure of Ganēsa. ”

“ But in any case, opinion agrees that the sound of the pipes does attract and interest the cobra. Wild cobras are also induced by the pipe-player to come out from the holes in old wells or ruins in which they have taken up their residence, the snake being noosed when its body is sufficiently clear of the hole to enable it to be jerked away by the snake-charmer’s partner.
The behaviour of the cobras at the Zoo more than justified the Indian stories. We selected for our serenade a large yellow Indian cobra, which was lying coiled up asleep on the gravel at the bottom of its cage. ”

“ They closed. In the moonlight I could distinctly see the head of a cobra lying on another branch very near mine. I had disturbed him going up. I knew if I moved a little he would get up and sting me to death, so I sat very still.
Soon there was a terrible hooting and calling in the jungle. I heard hoofs stampeding in the distance. The noise grew louder and louder and I could feel a vast warm tongue licking the cool silence of the night. Then the cobra crawled along the branch to the [122] trunk of the tree, and then on down to the ground. ”

“ One of these men will take a Cobra in his bare hands, toss it about with perfect indifference, allow it to twine about his naked breast, tie it around his neck, and treat it with as little ceremony as if it were an earth-worm. ”

“ I say the Egyptian cobra, because there is a closely allied species, the cobra of India (Naja tripudians) , which very much resembles the Naja haje, and which is also tamed by serpent-charmers. A passing allusion to this custom in taming Serpents is made by St. James in his General Epistle, chap. iii. 7: "For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed by mankind:
"But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison."
How the serpent-charmers perform their feats is not very intelligible. ”

“ With the exception of the rat-snake [2] , the cobra de capello is the only serpent which seems from choice to frequent the vicinity of human dwellings, but it is doubtless attracted by the young of the domestic fowl and by the moisture of the wells and drainage. The Singhalese remark that if one cobra be destroyed near a house, its companion is almost certain to be discovered immediately after,—a popular belief which I had an opportunity of verifying on more than one occasion. ”

“ You have read, with thrilling nerves, how a huge cobra, reared on his coils, sways his terrible head from side to side before striking. Well, all those black heads before us were swaying in unison, but with a sickening circular movement, which was regularly reversed in direction. Three times by the right and then three times by the left those heads circled, in rhythmic cadence, while the luminous eyes seemed to leave phosphorescent rings in the air, intersecting one another in consequence of the rapidity of the motion.
It was such a spectacle as I had never beheld in the wildest dream. ”

“ As my foot rested on the upper part, I saw a cobra raise its head from among the branches, and I instantly fell back, escaping by the smallest distance from the rapid dart made by the reptile. To have been bitten would have been certain death, for a full-grown active cobra is sure to kill where he strikes.
Another escape was from a puff-adder, a snake equally as deadly as the cobra. I was looking after the cattle in the Umzimvubu country, and finding the sun very warm I went to an acacia tree, so as to sit in the shade, and sat down on a rock near which was some moss. ”

“ These timid practitioners, however, who thus charm or tame this small and apparently innoxious creature, are mere children compared with those daring adepts of Hindostan who, by the 25force of spells or skill, compel the cobra di capello, the most deadly and terrible of reptiles, to rear himself in spiry volumes, and dance, or rather wriggle, like a Nautch girl, for the amusement of the crowd. ”

“ So it seems that even the deadly cobra is not as black as it is painted, but can be tamed and made a friend of by man. When the snake-charmer wants a new snake he plays on his pipe near places in which serpents are apt to hide, and the cobra and other snakes come out and are caught. Sometimes the poison fangs are drawn out of the snake's jaws, but often they are not, the charmers knowing how to avoid being bitten. If bitten, they know how to take care of a bite. ”

“ Since the bite of the cobra is so deadly, it is well that travellers are not likely to meet it; for in the day-time it sleeps in the depths of the forest, gliding silently out at night in search of food. The bold naturalist, of whose alligator-ride you have heard, says that he never saw any snake pursue a retreating prey; so that when a man, threading the mazes of a forest, sees a serpent gliding towards him, he has but to turn into a side path, and be safe. But if a snake is trodden upon, or otherwise roused to anger, it will dart forward upon its enemy, in self-defence ”

“ Curator Ditmars, of the New York Zoological Park, says that although he has "studied living examples of many species of deadly snakes—the South American bushmaster and the fer-de-lance, the African puff adder and the berg adder, and such East Indian species as the king cobra, the spectacled cobra and Russell's viper, and although there is indelibly stamped upon his mind the bloated body, the glassy stare and the rhythmic hissing of the berg adder, the rearing, uncanny pose of an infuriated cobra—there is one image vivid above all, the rattlesnake. ”

“ When they saw a huge cobra flying through the air toward them, there was a scampering and screaming, which might have been less had they known that the grip of the shears had dislocated the serpent's neck.
The good man did not forget that whenever you find one deadly serpent, another is quite certain to be close at hand. He had passed the wagon tire to the teacher, when he began pulling out the wounded cobra, and asked him to insert it again without an instant's delay. This was done, and returning with the hand-glass, the missionary once more conveyed the rays into the underground chamber. ”

“ The former of these, indeed, judging of it from the drawing which he gives must be a variety of the cobra or coluber naja, L. We may add that a very intelligent modern authority on the toxicology of the ancients, Ardoyn, gives such a description of the basilisk as applies very well to the cobra. The crown (corona) on the head can refer to no other serpent than the hooded snake. ”

“ Four officers sitting in a bungalow in India were deep in a game of whist. Suddenly one of them, turning deadly pale, made signs that no one should move or speak. In a hushed voice he exclaimed, ‘Keep still, for God’s sake! I feel a cobra crawling about my legs!’ He knew that timidity was one of the strongest characteristics of this snake, and that if not disturbed or alarmed, it would in due [88] time depart of its own accord. All present were accustomed to the stealthy intruders, and did not, happily, lose their presence of mind. ”

“ The cobra is a species of considerable interest to the zoologist. In the first place, several varieties exist. Some cobras have no figure marked on the hood, others display a pattern like a pair of spectacles, while others show a monocle. ”

“ Then inch by inch out of the grass rose up the head and spread hood of Nag, the big black cobra, and he was five feet long from tongue to tail. ”

“ The cobra is the snake usually exhibited by the Indian jugglers, who show great dexterity in handling it, even when not deprived of its fangs. Usually, however, the front fang at least is extracted, the creature being thus rendered harmless until the succeeding tooth takes its place, and in many cases all the fangs, with the germs behind, are removed—the cobra being thus rendered innocuous for life. ”

“ Notwithstanding the lethal nature of his bite, the cobra is said by all who know him intimately to be a gentle, timid creature. Sulkiness is his worst vice. In captivity he sometimes sulks to such a degree as to starve to death unless food be pushed down his gullet! The cobra is a reptile who prefers retiring gracefully to facing the foe. ”

“ So it is altogether fit that a performer of wonders should be on intimate terms with the serpent tribe. The snake-charmer keeps all sorts of them, but chiefly cobras. These he professes to charm from their holes by playing upon an instrument which may have some hereditary connection with the bagpipe, for it has an air-reservoir consisting of a large gourd, and it makes a most abominable noise. As soon as the cobra shows itself the charmer catches it by the tail with one hand, and, running the other swiftly along its body, grips it firmly just behind the jaws, so that it cannot turn and bite. ”

“ These cobras, like their kindred in Ceylon, have a great fondness for houses, and it makes little difference to them whether the places they inhabit belong to Europeans or natives. It makes you feel uncomfortable to think a deadly cobra may be under your feet as you walk on the grass, or may enter your room while you are sleeping. The other day we were breakfasting with a gentleman whose bungalow is on Malabar Hill, and after breakfast the conversation turned on snakes ”

“ The cobra writhes, and strikes sometimes at the stick, sometimes at his tormentor's legs, and again at his hands, all which is avoided with the utmost nonchalance. After the lapse of about ten minutes, Mohammed coils the cobra on the floor, and leaves him while he goes to the box, and draws out another far fiercer cobra. While holding this by the tail, Mohammed buffets him on the head with his open hand, and the serpent, quite furious, frequently seizes him by the forearm. The lad merely wipes the spot, and proceeds to tie the serpent like a necklace around his neck. ”

“ The cobra lives in old walls or heaps of stone and timber, under roots, or in dead trunks in the forest, in fact anywhere where he can find a sheltered hole. He does not avoid human dwellings, and he may often be seen, heavy and motionless, rolled up before his hole. But as soon as a man approaches he glides quickly and noiselessly into his hole, and if attacked defends himself with a weapon which is as dangerous as a revolver. ”

“ Had Trüey known the character of that reptile, she would have trembled all the more. She saw before her one of the most venomous of serpents, the black naja, or “spitting-snake”—the cobra of Africa—far more dangerous than its congener the cobra de capello of India, because far more active in its movements, and equally fatal in its bite. ”

“ About twelve o'clock the cobra came up the steps from the lake in search of food. He had the diamond in his mouth, and, attracted by the sweet scents and flowers, instead of going into the jungle, he proceeded towards the tree in which Seventee Bai was. ”