It is impossible to get reliable local information as to which of the snakes are poisonous or not. If you ask an Indian about the character of any snake he always answers, "Very bad." But it is the cobra which is really an unpleasant creature to have any dealings with. Most other snakes will try and slink into a corner, or hide up. But the cobra, if cornered, shows fight and becomes formidable. He raises himself up a foot or two, puffs out his mantle, sways his head about as if he was taking aim, and strikes with great force to some distance, according to his size. I do not know if there are any instances recorded of recovery from the bite of a cobra, but if so, they are exceedingly rare.
Early one morning we found a cobra in a sleepy state, just outside one of the church doors. By his swollen condition it was evident that he was digesting his last meal. It was easy to despatch him with a long bamboo, which we keep for cobras. But at the first blow he had still energy just to raise his head into the fighting attitude, when he looks most forbidding. We found inside him a frog, dead but otherwise in good preservation, which accounted for his distended and sleepy state. One day, just after Evensong, when the people were coming out of church, one of the boys heard a hiss, and saw a cobra in the angle of a buttress. The long bamboo was again equal to the occasion.
The village schoolmaster, returning in the dark with his family after a day's holiday, heard a hiss as he opened his house door, and he saw a snake glide down the verandah. But it was too dark to see whether it went away, or whether it went into one of the other rooms. The process of investigation was rather an embarrassing one. The door of the next room was so situated that a view of the interior could not be got without going inside, and the snake might have hidden behind the door. After making loud demonstrations in the doorway with the bamboo, I ventured in cautiously, and by the light of a lantern which the master held, we saw at the further end of the room under a cot a large cobra, with its head raised and slowly waving about, according to its uncanny custom. As it was probable that it would make for the door if attacked, because there was no other exit, I at once pinned it against the wall with the long bamboo. A fierce contest raged for a few moments. The cobra flung itself hither and thither, and getting free, endeavoured to come down the room towards the door. Some sage advisers say, "Hit a snake on the tail and he will die." But when it is twisting about with marvellous rapidity and tying itself into fantastic knots, there is no time to consider where to hit it. No time is to be lost, and you must hit it wherever you can. I did so with the cobra, who presently began to show signs of collapse, and I was able to batter its head and the danger was over. We were grateful that the adventure ended so favourably. We hung up the corpse on a thorn hedge near by, as a warning to his tribe. But a snake is a dainty morsel to many creatures, and by the morning it was gone.