In my last paper I endeavoured to furnish my readers with a description
of serpent-charming, as at present practised by the jugglers of Egypt,
Arabia, and India. I now come to a review of the opinions maintained
respecting this mysterious art, and the secret on which it depends, by
some of the most eminent philosophers who have turned their attention to
the subject.
These opinions are as various as they are numerous, no two individuals
who have written upon the practice agreeing in any one particular, save
only their determination to regard the whole affair as an imposture--the
snake-charmers as clever and designing cheats, and all who believed in
the reality of their performances, as silly dupes. I shall merely advert
to some of the most striking of these suppositions, and then proceed to
an investigation of their merits, ere advancing my own theory on the
subject.
Many travellers who have written on the practice of serpent-charming have
declared it as their conviction that the process is based in deception,
that is, that the serpents charmed forth from holes are by no means wild
creatures, who really and naturally inhabit those recesses, but animals
which have been previously tamed, their poisonous fangs extracted, and
placed there by the juggler or an accomplice, in order to the performance
of his pretended miracle. Amongst the most prominent of these objectors
are to be found the Abbé Dubois and the traveller Denon; and the latter
author even goes so far as to affirm that the secret of the Psylli was
a piece of nonsense that he might easily have discovered had he been so
disposed. A precious traveller truly! to have had it in his power to
discover a secret that a hundred naturalists would have given their very
eyes to become acquainted with, and yet to neglect taking the necessary
trouble. Ah, Monsieur Denon, how you do remind me of the witty fable of
the fox and the sour grapes! The Abbé Dubois, though equally sceptical,
does not venture to handle this mysterious subject quite so cavalierly as
Denon. He says that the Psylli perform various _tricks_ with serpents,
which, though apparently terrible, are not very dangerous, as they
_always_ take the precaution to have the fangs previously removed, and
to have with them the venomous vesicle extracted. He likewise informs us
that they are _supposed_ to have the power of charming those dangerous
reptiles, and of commanding them to approach and surrender themselves
at the sound of music; and he quotes the passages of scripture to which
I referred in my preceding article, as confirmatory of the authenticity
of the practice; yet he will not admit that even this mass of evidence
will convince that the charmer’s art is aught but an imposture. “Without
dwelling,” says he, “on the literal accuracy of this striking passage
of Holy Scripture, I may confidently affirm that the skill which the
Indian _pretenders to enchantment_ claim in this particular, is rank
imposture. The trick consists in placing a snake, previously tamed and
accustomed to music, in some remote place, and they manage it so that in
appearing accidentally to approach that place, and beginning to play,
the snake comes forward at the wonted sounds. When they enter into an
agreement with any simpleton who fancies that his house is infested with
serpents--a notion which they sometimes contrive to infuse into his
brain--they cunningly introduce some tame snakes into some crevice of
his house, which come to their master as soon as he sounds his musical
call. The chuckling enchanter then instantly whips up the serpent,
claps it into his basket, pockets his fee, and, all the while doubtless
laughing in his sleeve, goes to some other house, to renew his offers of
assistance to similar dupes.”
As to the idea that the snakes are previously deprived of their fangs,
and that the jugglers secure themselves against all danger of being
injured by the regular dancing snakes that they carry about with them in
baskets, a single anecdote related by Forbes, in his Oriental Memoirs,
will I think suffice to combat and refute it. Not having the book by me
while I write, I hope my readers will excuse any slight discrepancies
which they may detect on a reference to my authority. Forbes states
that on the cessation of the music the reptiles lapse into a sort of
lethargy, and appear motionless. It is, however, he adds, necessary that
they should be immediately covered up in the baskets, as otherwise they
may spring upon and wound the spectators; and he informs us that fatal
accidents frequently occur from inattention to this precaution. Amongst
his drawings is that of a Cobra de Capella, which, under the magic
influence of a professed serpent-charmer’s music, danced before him for
an hour upon his table while he painted it, and during that period he
repeatedly handled it and carefully examined the structure of its head,
hood, and jaws, and inspected minutely the variety and extreme beauty
of its spots. The following day an upper servant of his rushed into
his apartment, and cried out that he was a fortunate, a most fortunate
man, doubtless under the immediate protection of the Prophet--that
his devotions had proved acceptable, and sundry other expressions,
totally incomprehensible to Forbes, who inquired his meaning. The man
then related that he had just been in the bazaar, where he had seen
the same juggler who had entertained him the day preceding, performing
before a crowd of people, who, as was usual on such occasions, formed a
circle around the operator, seated on the ground. At the close of the
performance, the reptile, whether infuriated from the music ceasing too
suddenly, or from some other cause not to be explained, darted amongst
the spectators, and seizing a young woman by the throat, inflicted a
wound of which she died in about an hour. Here was proof positive that
the extraction of the serpent’s fangs was thought by no means essential
to training him to his performance.
So much for the idea that the _dancing_ snakes are always deprived of
their fangs--now as to the reality of the circumstance of the _wild_
serpents being drawn forth from their holes by the charmer’s pipe, and
not being _tamed animals_ placed in those holes for the express purpose
of deception.
Perhaps the best refutation of this idea that I can adduce, will be found
in a highly interesting account I received lately from a friend resident
for many years in India, and who directed a more than ordinary degree of
attention to snake-charmers and their feats; nay, not merely to them,
but to every other description of magical rites, of which no land now
furnishes so many wonder-working adepts as India, not even Egypt.
He told me of men who would sow a seed of corn in a flower-pot, and by
sundry mysterious incantations cause it to sprout, grow up, throw off
leaves, bud, produce grain, and ripen, all within the space of an hour.
He told me of men who would turn an empty hamper upside down, and produce
from thence shawls, jewels, strings of beads, muslin turbans, and, in
short, any article the spectators chose to demand. He told me many other
singular and wondrous stories; but, what at present is of more immediate
importance, he gave me a singular account of serpent-charming. I need not
recapitulate its details, as they precisely resemble those quoted in a
former article: I need only observe, that he assured me he had examined
the subject too closely, and had taken too many precautions to prevent
the possibility of fraud, to admit of its being, in any one instance,
practised upon him. He had sent a distance of fifty miles up the country
for a snake-catcher, and had set him to work in a spot entirely unknown
to all as the place he had selected, until he conducted them and the
juggler thither; and he had dozens of times seen the reptiles drawn from
their retreats by the sounds of the flute or fife, which they evidently
derived extreme pleasure from hearing. It was my friend’s opinion
that the chief agent in the operation of serpent-charming was music;
the animals positively delighted in the sound of the soft instruments
employed by the performers, and were by its influence lulled into a sort
of pleasurable trance whenever the exciting cause was put in operation.
My friend once sat beneath the shade of a spreading tree, and was
amusing himself with his flageolet, an instrument on which he performed
with much skill; he had not been thus employed above an hour, when a
native, happening to come up the approach to his residence, suddenly
started, and began muttering prayers as fast as he was able. My friend
could scarcely refrain from laughing at this singular exhibition, being
entirely ignorant of its cause, and was about to rise up, when the
stranger called out to him to remain where he was, and keep playing upon
his instrument if he valued his life, for that imminent danger threatened
him. This announcement, instead of producing the desired effect, only
confirmed my friend in the supposition that the strange Hindoo was some
mad fakir, who, half knave and half crazy, was endeavouring to play
upon his feelings, as he so frequently and successfully did upon those
of his silly countrymen. He accordingly sprang to his feet; but what
his consternation was, you, reader, may judge. As he rose, a prodigious
Cobra de Capella presented itself to his astonished and affrighted gaze,
hanging by its tail from the tree, its gleaming eyes and hooded head
not more than two feet from his own! For a moment he felt as it were
fascinated, rooted to the spot; but in a second afterwards, terror acted
in her more legitimate manner: he sprang several paces backward, and
running to the house, procured assistance, on which he again sallied
forth, accompanied by several natives, who by their cries and hooting
succeeded in inducing the snake to beat a retreat. He was watched,
however, in his departure, and traced to a hole; a guard was placed over
it, and that too of Europeans, so that no confederacy could exist. A
snake-catcher was procured from a distance of ten miles; he approached
the hole, played upon his instrument, and at length the reptile crawled
forth, and was captured and secured in the usual manner.
I think that even this brief and hurried account must have compelled my
readers to cast from their minds all notion of the snakes being _laid
in the proper places_ by the jugglers beforehand, as preparatory to a
performance, as I have shown in the instances above mentioned that no
such thing could have been done. And the idea of the creature’s having
been previously rendered harmless, is also overturned by the circumstance
of the Cobra de Capella, handled one day with impunity by Forbes, having
on the following morning bitten a young woman, who died of the effects
of the poison within an hour. I trust, then, that I have brought you to
admit that the art of snake-charming is a _genuine_ art, whether simple
or not remains to be proved when the true secret shall have been found
out; and that the professors of this secret are not impostors, at least
not in this particular, but at the very least as respectable characters
as the rat-catchers of our native country, who, my readers are of course
aware, pretend likewise to possess the secret of charming and enticing
rats from any place. In my next paper I shall conclude this subject of
_charming_, and endeavour to explain some of the modes by which various
animals are thus seduced.