Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/482

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active in his movements, and a master of the science of projectiles. He springs upon his prey from beneath shrubs, &c., after having turned himself rapidly round and round upon the ground to obtain that rotatory motion for his flight which alone insures accuracy of aim. He is quite a Whitworth in his way, is this small serpent, the Acontia; and brings down his man at twenty cubits distance. The Paubera secures his prey with a hook, which is fastened to the end of his tail. He swallows oxen alive and entire, and consequently suffers severely from indigestion on account of the horns. Our old friends the asps, vipers, boas, anacondas, cobras, and rattlesnakes figure in this strange company, and we have many novelties concerning their nature and value. You would not imagine, now, that from vipers “many noble medicines are prepared,” and that “a wine from their flesh is singular in consumptive, leporous, and scorbutic cases,” or that “they afford also a volatile salt, the most generous cordial in nature.” Great is the power of simple things. If ever, dear reader, you meet a rattlesnake, don’t run away, but get a branch of wild penny-royal; then, having fastened it to the end of a stick, present it to the creature’s nose, and if it be only of the family,

The Mistress of Serpents.

one of which was so dealt with by Captain Silas Taylor, in the year 1657, it will turn and wriggle, labouring hard to avoid the potent herb, and die in less than half an hour from its mere scent. In order that there may be no mistake as to the identity of the reptile to be thus disposed of, we subjoin a portrait of the rattlesnake, copied from plate 7 of the work now before us. It differs somewhat from the conventional idea of that reptile, and the experimenter will do well not to trust to penny-royal for deliverance from any other variety. The Amphisbæna serpent is said to have two heads, but the doctor is not quite prepared to believe this statement. “Perhaps”—he says—“the reason for ascribing two heads to this serpent might be because it is said to poison by the tail and teeth. Others say that both ends are so alike in figure and bulk that they are not easily distinguished.” Why not describe it, then, as having two tails?

“Amongst serpents,” writes Dr. Owen, “authors place dragons—creatures terrible and fierce in aspect and nature. They are divided into Apodes and Pedates, some with feet and some without them; some are provided with wings, and others are destitute of wings and feet. Some are covered with sharp scales which make a bright appearance in certain positions. Dragons have been observed about the Ganges, “whose eyes sparkle like precious stones.” In Ethiopia—a favourite venue of our author’s, by the way, for marvellous annals—the ordinary land-dragon grows to be thirty paces^[1] long, and kills elephants in this wise. He twines himself round the legs of his victims, and then, “thrusting his head up their nostrils, stings them, and sucks their blood till they are dead.” The accompanying fac-simile of this dragon’s portrait will show how admirably nature had adapted him—he is at least seventy-five feet long, remember,—for thrusting his head up the nostrils of an elephant.

The Ethiopian Dragon.

The winged dragon is represented as a Saurian of a decidedly mild and aristocratic cast of countenance. But the most curious illustration in the book is that of the Basilisk of the deserts of Africa. So deadly is this creature that the sound of his voice puts all the serpents to flight. “Tradition says that its eyes and its breath are killing,

The Sea Scolopendra.

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1. A note explains that a geometrical pace is five feet; “but,” adds our author, “if it be the lesser pace only, viz., the measure of two feet and a half, it must needs be a monstrous animal.” We are inclined to agree with him.