THE FIRST ANAESTHETIST.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 4, 5 January 1914, Page 6

THE FIRST A N A ESTHETIST.

HOW THE GLOWWORM CROCS \ THE SNAIL. ...-,'■; 'Hie fact that./the glowworm anaesthetises its prey bef/oro eating irt/has been discovered by M. Henri Fabre, the great French entomologist. ,• His story. of the glowworm, ."the first user of anaesthetics," is told in the current number of the "Century Magazine." The principal prey of the glowworm is ihe snail, which it "chloroforms, rivalling in the process the wonders of modern surgery."

The glowworm examines its prey for a moment, and then "draws" its weapon, two mandibles bent back into a powerful hook, very sharp, and as thin as a hair.. It repeatedly taps the snail with this instrument. Half a dozenwtaps deprive the snail of all power of movement, and the glowworm proceeds to devour it, or, rather, to drink it, for the glowworm has the power of converting the snail's body gradually into a liquid. !\f. Fabre experimenteo* on a. snail which bad been thus anaesthetised, and found it quite insensible to the pricks of a needle. After two or three days, however, it recovered consciousness. A cold douche hastened its recovery.