INTRODUCTION
OPHIOTOX. Poison of Serpents. See Hering’s “Treatise on the Poison of Serpents,” The following symptoms include those from the Naja-tripudians, marked (N.), and from Brazil Snakes, marked (B.).
GENERAL SYMPTOMS.
Paralysis of the limbs. Chronic paralysis, also particularly of the lower limbs. Apoplexy. The flesh of serpents is a popular remedy for paralysis in Brazil. Cachectic condition. Languor and difficulty of motion. Chronic debility. Irresistible weariness (B.). Physical and mental prostration. Fainting turns (also N.), preceded by nausea and accompanied by vomiting, vertigo, obscuration of sight, loss of sensibility, difficult of swallowing, and loss of all the senses. Fainting, with spasms of the back (N). Loss of sensibility, as if dead, also with lock-jaw (N.) Loss of sight and hearing, with inability to swallow (N). Insensibility and prostration, with vomiting. Rigidity of the body, like that of a corpse, with loss of muscular power and vanishing of the senses and pulse. Trembling of the whole body. The bile of serpents is a popular remedy for epilepsy. Distortion of the limbs and subsultus-tendinum. Complete rigidity, with entire consciousness. The poison of serpents generally occasions: local swelling, with discharge, first of blood, then of an oily substance, and lastly of pus and slaver. Frightful pains, moving to and fro. Difficulty of breathing, with great heat, fever, and burning colored urine. Head-strongest and imbecility. Vertigo and bleeding at the nose. Cold sweats, entire prostration of strength, and apoplexy.
SKIN,.
Itch-like eruptions. Yellow color of the skin. Jaundice. Erysipelas. Small vesicles, or spreading blisters, round the wound. Blisters, also black blisters, on the skin. Blisters as from heat, with burning of the skin. Pale, hard swelling. Swelling of the glands and lymphatic vessels, in the neighborhood of the wound. Swelling of the whole body, particularly the abdomen. Swelling with lethargy. The bezoary of the snake is a popular remedy for dropsy. Large tumors and swellings on the body, particularly in the joints. Ulcers. Gangrene of the bitten spot, with an ulcer of large circumference. Purple-redness, with blueness and blackness of the bitten arm, accompanied with violent vomiting, and excited, hard pulse. In the wound; stinging, also in the whole limb, or violent sticking, with bleeding. The blood rushes out of the wound like a jet. The blood is a first red, then black and badly-colored. Venous blood is discharged from the closed wound. Discharge of purulent blood and lymphatic fluid. A bloody froth presses out of every orifice of the body. Symptoms of decomposition of the blood.
SLEEP.
Great inclination to sleep. Lethargy with loss of consciousness. Lethargy, with swelling and gangrene of the part, vomiting, convulsions, and pain about the heart. Moaning and thirst during sleep.
FEVER.
Coldness of the skin, with feeble pulse, or with loss of sensibility. Coldness of the limbs. Pulse small and irregular. Pulse quick and scarcely perceptible. Pulse collapsing with consciousness. Pulse quick and feverish. Pulse animated and hard, with insensibility and swelling of the arm. Violent fever and great heat, with malaise, headache, nausea, and inflammation of the wound. Violent acute fever, with delirium, attended with swelling. Cold sweats, also very copious, local, or general. Sweats that afford relief.
MORAL SYMPTOMS.
Intolerable, oppressive anxiety. Anguish, with dread of death, or with thirst. Restlessness. Nervous irritation, with crying on hearing the least noise. The pains are intolerable.
SENSORIUM.
Imbecility. Sudden stupefaction. Stupefaction, with loss of sense, irregular motions of the limbs, cold, clammy sweat, and small, slow, almost imperceptible pulse. Stupefaction with loss of sight; with foam at the mouth. Loss of consciousness. Intoxication.
HEAD.
Aching pains in the frontal cavities and eyes. Heaviness and fullness of the head. Congestion of blood to the head, with violent acute fever. Swelling of the head. Falling of the hair.
EYES.
Redness of the conjunctiva, with excessive drowsiness, heavy, languid appearance around the eyes. Protruded eyes. Dim eyes, without lustre. The fat of serpents is said to be good for pellicles on the eye. Obscuration of sight and loss of sensibility. Failure of sight. Blindness.
EARS.
Insensibility of hearing and sight. Haemorrhage from the ears.
NOSE.
Bleeding from the nose, and from every orifice of the body. Bleeding from the nose, with vertigo.
FACE.
Cadaverous features. Expression of anxiety in the face with stupefaction. Distortion and twitching of the facial muscles. Paleness of the face. Bloatedness of the face, with prostration and heavy breathing. Feeling of tension around the eyes, mouth, and nose, with bloatedness and formication of those parts. The face is red and swollen. Swelling of the lips. Lock-jaw, with loss of consciousness and intermittent breathing (N.).
MOUTH.
Inflammation of the inner mouth. Haemorrhage from the mouth. Foam at the mouth (N.) Constant urging to discharge a frothy mucus from the mouth, with stupefaction, insensibility, and difficult breathing. Violent ptyalism. Accumulation of mucus in the mouth as soon as he introduces anything into his mouth, attended with suffocative fits. Thick white coating of the tongue. Tongue coated yellow, black, or trembling. Spasmodic stretching of the tongue, with difficulty of drawing it back (N.) The voice is becoming extinct.
THROAT.
Paralysis of the oesophagus, in animals (N.) Difficulty of swallowing, also with spasms of the back (N.) Violent spasm of the oesophagus, preventing deglutition. Hydrophobia (B.).
APPETITE AND GASTRIC SYMPTOMS.
Raging thirst. Hiccough. Nausea, also with fainting (N.) Nausea and bilious vomiting. Nausea and diarrhoea. Nausea with coldness of the whole body. Vomiting. Spasmodic bilious vomiting, also with great bitterness. Vomiting, with paralysis; with insensibility and stupefaction; with swelling.
STOMACH AND ABDOMEN.
Pains in the stomach, with anguish and vomiting; with haemorrhage, diarrhoea, difficulty of breathing, and paralysis. Excessive colic in the umbilical region.
STOOL AND URINE.
Bilious diarrhoea. Colic, with haemorrhage from the anus, bladders, ears, mouth and nose. Difficulty of urinating. Paralysis of the bladder. Burning, colored urine. Urine with brick-dust sediment.
LARYNX AND CHEST.
Offensive breath. Difficulty of breathing, with vomiting and diarrhoea. Suffocating fits in a child, whenever anything was put into his mouth, attended with accumulation of mucus (N.) Constant gasping for breath, with languor (N.) Difficult, slow breathing, with slow circulation (N.) Spasmodic breathing, with dim eyes, and other unfavorable symptoms; afterwards profuse sweat. Painfully breathing (N.) also with stupefaction and anguish. Oppression of the chest. Pain in the chest. Beats of the heart, small and trembling. Affections of the heart. Dropsy of the pericardium. Enlargement of the heart.
BACK.
Spasms of the dorsal muscles. Paralysis of the lower limbs. Bandaging the leg with the skin of a serpent is said to remove cramp of the calf. Hard blue-red swelling from the tip of the toe to the knee, with pain about the malleolus. Swelling of the legs, with holes. Icy-cold feet.
