A coroner's inquest was held next day,
and a post-mortem examination took place. My
friend and I were in the same office, and the
facts were received from his own lips; besides
which, the depositions and the evidence of the
medical men left no doubt that death did ensue
with such frightful rapidity as to leave no time
for trying remedies.

I am sceptical as to the virtues of the snake-
stone. I have seen snake-charmers bitten, and
have seen the stone applied, but there was no
evidence of a satisfactory nature that the poison
of that particular snake had not been extracted.
On the other hand, there are many whose opinion
is entitled to weight who believe in its efficacy.

One night a servant of mine was bitten by a
snake, and seemed in great agony. The snake
had escaped, so that no one could tell of what
kind it was. The medical sub-assistant of the
station used the lancet freely to the wound, and,
if I remember right, cauterised it; the pain
subsided after a few hours. The snake may,
however, not have been a very venomous one. I
remember one evening striking with my shoe at a
cockroach, and bringing it down within a few
inches of a deadly snake, which I had not observed
before. Such incidents almost everybody
can tell of. It proves, as before remarked, that
a venomous snake is slow to use his fangs, and
that very often we pass in ignorance quite close
by these animals. Two gentlemen in the civil
service of the island were out shooting together.
A herd of deer was seen a short way off, and
they commenced stalking them. One of the
two, an old sportsman, wished to give his friend
the first shot: so he whispered to him to advance
first, while he followed a few paces in the rear.
The foremost of the two, with eye intently fixed
on the deer, advanced on tiptoe. His friend
behind, to his intense horror, saw him put down
his foot exactly over one of the most deadly
snakes in the island, as it lay across his path.
It was too late to warn him; but providentially,
walking as he did on tiptoe, he trod so that
the heel did not press on the reptile; he passed
on, and so, unknown to himself, escaped deadly
danger. A friend of mine was, while clearing
some jungle, bitten by a venomous snake:
whereupon he himself cut out the piece, applied
some gunpower, set it on fire, and allowed it to
fiz away on the wound. He experienced no
permanent ill effects. A Singhalese toddy-
charmer was once bitten in the finger by a
deadly snake; on which he laid the finger against
a tree, raised his sharp billhook, and with one
blow severed the finger from the hand.

The lion and the Bengal tiger are unknown in
Ceylon; but we have the cheetah, or more
properly the leopard—another "Trifle" to be
found there. These animals are very destructive
to cattle, and are much dreaded on that
account, but it is seldom that they attack man.
There is now and then an instance of a cheetah
carrying off a man while asleep, but it is
exceedingly rare. It is only when wounded or
attacked that a cheetah will fly at a man; as a
general rule, he is a cowardly animal, and only
attacks the weak. He is exceedingly fond of
dogs, and will sometimes pounce on one and
carry him off close to his master's side, taking
care however, to get away as soon as possible.
At Newera Ellia, the mountain sanitarium of
the island, where English hounds can live and
thrive, elk hunting is a favourite amusement.
Occasionally it happens that the dogs sight and
attack a cheetah, and then sad havoc is made
in the pack before the huntsmen can come up
and drive away the cheetah, or call off the pack.
Sir Emerson Tennent has related the fact which
occurred at this place of a cow pounding to
death a cheetah. The old cow was called
Tickery Banda, after a Kandian chieftain, from
whom a friend of mine had bought her, and was
in charge of an Englishman at Newera Ellia.
The extraordinary part of the story is, that the
old lady had no horns; but what will not
maternal affection do? The cheetah got into
the shed where Mrs. Tickery Banda and her
calf were, expecting to have an easy prey; but
he reckoned without his hostess; Mrs. T. B.
went at him tooth and nail—or rather head and
horny protuberances—pounded him again and
again against the walls, jammed him into a jelly,
and left him so little life, that next morning,
when the master opened the stable, the cheetah
had scarcely any life left in him, and a shot
from a pistol settled him. The old girl's nerves
received a terrible shock, however, on this
memorable occasion; for some time afterwards,
she did not know friend from foe: or rather, she
assumed every one to be a foe till the contrary
was proved. She would rush at her dearest
friend, rip and snort, and offer to pound him
against an imaginary wall. Time, the great
restorer, brought back repose to her over-
wrought mind, and it is believed that she died
at peace with all mankind.

One afternoon not very long ago, a magistrate
in the north of the island was told that a
cheetah had wounded a woman in a village not
far off, where never before had cheetah been
heard of, and where, indeed, there was scarcely
cover enough to hide a hare. He drove to the
spot armed with a gun, and found that a woman
had indeed been wounded by some animal or
other. Her face and shoulders had been torn,
but she was able to sit up and speak. The
story was, that she had gone to an adjoining
garden, when suddenly a cheetah sprang on her,
clawed her, and left her. All the men who
remained in the village were armed, many had
left it, and the cheetah was apparently master
of the position. On the gentleman's proceeding
to a palmyra garden not far off, a cheetah was
pointed out to him, lying with his head behind a
tree in such a way that no vital part was
exposed. Fearing he might run away if any
attempt were made to get a better shot, the
assailant advanced quietly until within twenty-five
yards of him, and sent a ball through his flanks.
Up sprang the cheetah with a series of growls
between the bark of a dog and a monkey, and
came at his foe, who covered him with his gun,
resolved to give him the remaining barrel at