The fangs proper, those formidable weapons whose threatening presence quails the boldest opponent, inspires the fear of man, and puts to flight the entire animal kingdom—­lions, tigers, and leopards, all but the restless and plucky mongoose—­and whose slightest scratch is attended with such dire results, are two in number, one in each upper jaw, and placed anteriorly to all other teeth, which they exceed by five or six times in point of size.  Situated just within the lips, recurved, slender, and exceeding in keenness even the finest of cambric needles, they are penetrated in their longitudinal diameter by a delicate, hair-like canal opening into a groove at the apex, terminating on the anterior surface in an elongated fissure.  As the canal is straight, and the tooth falciform, a like groove or longitudinal fissure is formed at the base, where it is inclosed by the aperture of the duct that communicates with the poison apparatus.

At the base of each fang, and extending from a point just beneath the nostril, backward two-thirds the distance to the commissure of the mouth, is the poison gland, analogous to the salivary glands of man, that secretes a pure, mucous saliva, and also a pale straw-colored, half-oleaginous fluid, the venom proper.  Within the gland, venom and saliva are mingled in varying proportions coincidently with circumstances; but the former slowly distills away and finds lodgment in the central portion of the excretory duct, that along its middle is dilated to form a bulb-like receptacle, and where only it may be obtained in perfect purity.

When the reptile is passive, the fangs are arranged to lie backward along the jaw, concealed by the membrane of the mouth, and thus offer no impediment to deglutition.  Close inspection, however, at once reveals not only their presence, but also several rudimentary ones to supply their place in case of injury or accident.  The bulb of the duct, too, is surrounded by a double aponeurotic capsule, of which the outermost and strongest layer is in connection with a muscle by whose action both duct and gland are compressed at will, conveying the secretion into the basal aperture of the fang, at the same time refilling the bulb.

When enraged and assuming the offensive and defensive, the reptile draws the posterior portion of its body into a coil or spiral, whereby the act of straightening, in which it hurls itself forward to nearly its full length, lends force to the blow, and at the same instant the fangs are erected, drawn forward in a reverse plane, permitting the points to look outward beyond the lips.  The action of the compressor muscles is contemporaneous with the blow inflicted, the venom being injected with considerable violence through the apical outlets of the fangs, and into the bottom of the wound.  If the object is not attained, the venom may be thrown to considerable distances, falling in drops; and Sir Arthur Cunynghame in a recent work on South Africa relates that he was cautioned not to approach a huge cobra of six feet or more in length in its death agony, lest it should hurl venom in his eyes and create blindness; he afterward found that an officer of Her Majesty’s XV.  Regiment had been thus injured at a distance of forty-five feet, and did not recover his eyesight for more than a week.[1]