GREAT BOA. 575 



between these larger marks are disposed many smaller ones of un- 

 certain forms, and more or less numerous in different parts; the 

 ground-colour itself is also scattered over by a great many small 

 specks, of the same colour with the variegations j the exterior 

 edges of all the larger spots and markings are commonly blackish, 

 or of a much deeper cast than the middle part, and the ground 

 colour immediately accompanying the outward edges of the spots 

 is, on the contrary, lighter than on other parts, or even whitish, 

 thus constituting a general richness of pattern, of which nothing 

 but an actual view of a highly-coloured specimen of the animal 

 itself can convey a complete idea. In larger specimens, the yellow 

 tinge is often lost in an uniform grey cast, and the red tinge of the 

 variegations sinks into a deep chesnut; and in some the general 

 regularity of the pattern before described is disturbed by a kind of 

 confluent appearance j the head is always marked above by a large 

 longitudinal dark band, and by a narrower lateral band passing 

 across the eyes towards the neck. 



The boa constrictor is a native of Africa, India, the larger 

 Indian islands, and South America, where it chiefly resides in the 

 most retired situations in woody and marshy regions. 



It was, in all probability, an enormous specimen of this very 

 serpent that once diffused so violent a terror amongst the most 

 valiant of mankind, and threw a whole Roman army into dismay. 

 Historians relate this surprising event in terms of consideraMe 

 luxuriance. Valerius Maximus thus mentions it from Livy, in one 

 of the lost books of whose history it was related more at large. 



41 And since we are on the subject of uncommon phenomena, 

 we may here mention the serpent so eloquently and accurately re- 

 corded by Livy ; who says, that near the river Bagrada, in Africa, 

 a snake was seen of so enormous a magnitude as to prevent the 

 army of Attilus Regulus from the use of the river ; and after 

 snatching up several soldiers with his enormous mouth, and de- 

 vouring them, and killing several more by striking and squeezing 

 them with the spires of its tail, was at length destroyed by assailing 

 it with all the force of military engines and showers of stones, after 

 it had withstood the attack of their spears and darts: that it was 

 regarded by the whole army as a more formidable enemy than even 

 Carthage itself; and that the whole adjacent region being tainted 

 with the pestilential effluvia proceeding from its remains, and the 



