portion of Pliny's work, narrates the alarm into which the troops
under Regulus were thrown by a serpent which had its lair on the banks
of the river Bagradas, between Utica and Carthage, and which
intercepted the passage to the river. It resisted ordinary weapons,
and killed many of the men; till at last it was destroyed by heavy
stones thrown from military engines used in battering walls; its
length is stated as a hundred and twenty feet. Regulus carried its
skin and jaws to Rome, and deposited them in one of the temples, where
they remained till the time of the Numantine war.

Diodorus Siculus relates the account of the capture of a serpent, not
without loss of life, in Egypt, which measured thirty cubits long; it
was taken to Alexandria. Suetonius speaks of a serpent exhibited at
Rome in front of the Comitium, fifty cubits in length.

Though we do not refuse credit to these narratives, it must be added
that in modern days we have not seen serpents of such magnitude; yet
they may exist. Bontius observes that some of the Indian pythons
exceed thirty-six feet in length, and says that they swallow wild
boars, adding, "there are those alive who partook with General Peter
Both, of a recently swallowed hog cut out of the belly of a serpent of
this kind."

These snakes, he observes, are not poisonous, but strangle a man or
other animal by powerful compression. The Ular Sawa, or great Python
of the Sunda Isles, is said to exceed when full-grown, thirty feet in
length; and it is narrated that a "Malay prow being anchored for the
night under the Island of Celebes, one of the crew went ashore, in
search of betel nut, and, as was supposed, fell asleep on the beach,
on his return. In the dead of night, his companions on board were