363 LEAVES FROM THE 



By great Apollo's arm the python slain. 



O'er many a rood lay stretch'd upon the plain. 



Latona's son did his work with the graceful ease of a 

 divinity — oh, that the work of Leontius* had been spared 

 to us ! — but the mortals who were opposed by the enor- 

 mous python near Utica had a very different task to 

 perform : — 



Well knovvne it is that Attilius Regulus, generall under the 

 Romans during the wars against the Carthaginians, assailed a 

 serpent near the river Bagrada,t which carried in length 120 foot; 

 and before he could conquer him was driven to discharge upon him 

 arrows, quarrels, stones, bullets, and suchlike shot, out of brakes, 

 slings, and other engins of artillery, as if he had given the assault to 

 some strong warlike towne ; the proofe whereof was to be seen by 

 the mai'ks remaining in his skin and chawes, which, until the war of 

 Numantia, remained in a temple or conspicuous jilace of Rome. 



But, though vanquished, the monster had his re- 

 venge ; for his huge carrion and corrupt gore so polluted 

 the air and waters that his conquerors were obliged to 

 move their camp, not, however, without taking his skin 

 with them as spolia ojnma. General Peter Both made 

 a better thing of it with a great Indian python, for he 

 and his friends feasted on a magnificent wild boar, 

 which the enemy had pouched just before its defeat and 

 death.:}: 



* This ' famous imageur,' as Philemon Holland calls him, who 

 ' expressed lively in brasse,' executed, among other bronzes, ' one 

 Apollo playing upon his harpe ; as also another Apollo, and the 

 serpent killed with his arrowes, which image he surnamed Dicaeus, 

 i. e. just : for that when the citj' of Thebes was won by Alexander 

 the Great, the gold which he hid in the bosome thereof when hee 

 fled, was foimd there safe and not diminished, when the enemy 

 was gone and he retm'ned.' 



t Some write ' Bagradas' and ' Magradas' (Mejerda). 



X Bontius. Regulus was not the only great captain who had 

 to encounter other than human enemies. It was, no doubt, very 

 smart to say, 



Philip fought men, but Alexander women — 



