ly in the air, carbon burns away, and a
bulky white ash is left, retaining the shape and size of the stone."
This ash, as is evident from inspection, cannot have belonged to any
vegetable substance, for it is almost entirely composed of phosphate of
lime. Mr. Faraday adds that "if the piece of matter has ever been
employed as a spongy absorbent, it seems hardly fit for that purpose in
its present state; but who can say to what treatment it has been
subjected since it was fit for use, or to what treatment the natives may
submit it when expecting to have occasion to use it?"

The probability is, that the animal charcoal, when instantaneously
applied, may be sufficiently porous and absorbent to extract the venom
from the recent wound, together with a portion of the blood, before it
has had time to be carried into the system; and that the blood which Mr.
Faraday detected in the specimen submitted to him was that of the Indian
on whose person the effect was exhibited on the occasion to which my
informant was an eye-witness. The snake-charmers from the coast who
visit Ceylon profess to prepare the snake-stones for themselves, and
preserve the composition as a secret. Dr. Davy[1], on the authority of
Sir Alexander Johnston, says the manufacture of them is a lucrative
trade, carried on by the monks of Manilla, who supply the merchants of
India--and his analysis confirms that of Mr. Faraday. Of the three
different kinds which he examined--one being of partially burnt bone,
and another of chalk, the third, consisting chiefly of vegetable matter,
resembled a bezoar,--all of them (except the first, which possessed a
slight absorbent power) were quite inert, and incapable of having any
effect exclusive of that on the imagination of the patient. Thunberg was
shown the snake-stone used by the boers at the Cape in 1772, which was
imported for them "from the Indies, especially from Malabar," at so high
a price that few of the farmers could afford to possess themselves of
it; he describes it as convex on one side black, and so porous that
"when thrown into water, it caused bubbles to rise;" and hence, by its
absorption, it served, if speedily applied, to extract the poison from
the wound.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Account of the Interior of Ceylon_, ch. iii. p. 101.]

[Footnote 2: _Thunberg_, vol. 1. p. 155.]

_Caecilia_.--The rocky jungle, bordering the higher coffee estates,
provides a safe retreat for a very singular animal, first introduc