336 The Naturalist of Cumbrae. 



over the eggs. He said that he was not long in making 

 his way down. When near the bottom of the tree, 

 he looked up and saw the head of the serpent over the 

 nest gerning [grinning] and hissing at him, and he 

 thought it had something like a horn on its head, but 

 he was not sure. 



" The little boy, the least of the three (who might 

 be about eight or ten years of age, the other two being 

 perhaps two or three years older), said to me, with 

 rather an air of superior knowledge, and as if he were 

 speaking from undoubted fact, that there were flying 

 serpents in the wood. 



" I inquired if he had seen them. 



" He answered, ' Yes.' 



"Believing that the narratives of the others were 

 purely myths of the imagination, or made up of stories 

 that they had heard told, I was nevertheless impressed, 

 by the way the little boy expressed himself, that he 

 believed what he said. 



" I asked him if the creature had wings. 



"He said, 'Yes.' 



" Had it feathers or hair over its body ? 



" He said that he did not know. 

 " Had it feet ? 



" He said, ' Yes.' 



" I asked if it had two or four. 



" He answered that it had more than two, but he 

 did not know how many more. 



" I asked what shape it was. Was it like a mouse, 

 or a rat, or like what? For I still thought that 

 there was something real that he was attempting to 

 describe. 



