Bitten by a Katipo.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6266, 12 July 1890, Page 3

Bitten by a Katipo.

William Green, aged twenty-three, son of Mr Green, carpenter, of Kuripuni, had a terrible experience from the bite of a katipo, or poisonous spider. He was rabbiting at Rivera dale, on the Hast Coast, and was sleeping on the beach with a companion under a tent erected within a large hut. Before going to sleep they gathered some firewood on the shore, and placed it under cover a few. feet from the tent. (Decayed timber on the® beach’ is a favourite haunt of tho katipo) About 2am Green was aroused by something pricking bis arm just above the elbow. It seemed like the sting of a bee. Striking a match he noticed a spider crawling over the folds of the blankets, and despatched it with the bottom of the matchbox. Green’s companion wanted to suck the wound, but it was hardly perceptible, and the young man thought this would be useless. As the pain increased, he got up, dressed, and reached Biversdale station an hour later. Mr Meredith applied whisky and otherromedies, and in the morning Green hastened into Masterton. In the the meantime his arm had swollen, and Dr Beard was called, and endeavoured to ally the sufferings of his patient, who has passed through an ordeal he will never forget. The effect of tho poison was to produce muscular pains all over his body even to his legs, rivalling the tortures of rheumatic fever. He was seized with fits of shivering, followed with an outbreak of clammy perspiration, and his clothes had to be changed repeatedly, almost wringing wet. — Wairarapa Star.