The Citizen

The reputed fascination of the serpent's eye is the motive of a story in Mr. Ambrose Bierce's volume of tales entitled "In the Midst of Life." Mr. Brayton was the guest of a friend, an eminent zoologist, whose specialty, of which he had a fine collection, was snakes. Stretched upon a sofa in his own room, Mr. Brayton glanced from the book he was carelessly scanning while awaiting the summons to dinner and saw in the shadow under his bed two small points of light about an inch apart. He gave them no special thought and resumed his reading.

In a few minutes he gave an involuntary start and stared into the obscurity under the bed. His gaze disclosed the coils of a large serpent. The points of light were its eyes but they were no longer merely luminous points; they looked into his own with a malign significance. Brayton was a brave man, but this seemed an occasion when discretion was the better part of valor. He would beat a retreat, and backward, so as not to disturb the reptile. But instead of the movement his will had shaped his right foot was placed in advance of his left.

The snake did not move, but its eyes seemed to become larger and more intent. There were strange noises in Brayton's ears as, with reluctant steps, he could not refrain from drawing near the bed. Suddenly something struck him a hard blow upon the face. He had fallen to the floor.

The zoologist, startled by a terrible scream from above, rushed to his friend's room. There lay Brayton, senseless. As he bent over him he glanced under the bed.

"How did this thing get here?" he exclaimed, and pulling out the snake he flung it to the center of the room, where it lay without motion.

It was a stuffed snake. Its eyes were two shoe buttons.