– – . . . The Surukuku Snake of South America . . . Characteristics. – – To the genius and heroism of Hering the world owes this remedy and many another of which this has been the forerunner. When Hering’s first experiments were made he was botanising and zoologising on the Upper Amazon for the German Government. Except his wife, all those about him were natives, who told him so much about the dreaded Surukuku that he offered a good reward for a live specimen. At last one was brought in a bamboo box, and those who brought it immediately fled, and all his native servants with them. Hering stunned the snake with a blow on the head as the box opened, then, holding its head in a forked stick, he pressed the venom out of the poison bag upon sugar of milk. The effect of handling the virus and preparing the lower attenuations was to throw Hering into a fever with tossing delirium and mania – much to his wife’s dismay. Towards morning he slept, and on waking his mind was clear. He drank a little water to moisten his throat and the first question this indomitable prover asked was: ‘What did I do and say?’ His wife remembered vividly enough.
