secures an 

 enormous 

 Coulacanarm 

 snake. 



SOUTH AMERICA. 209 



where they were, and keep the little doff in, and 



*l> t. T 1J -I JOURNEY. 



that I would go m and reconnoitre. 



I advanced up to the place slow and cautious. Finds and 

 The snake was well concealed, but at last I made 

 him out; it was a Coulacanara, not poisonous, 

 but large enough to have crushed any of us to 

 death. On measuring him afterwards, he was 

 something more than fourteen feet long. This 

 species of snake is very rare, and much thicker, 

 in proportion to his length, than any other snake 

 in the forest. A Coulacanara of fourteen feet 

 in length is as thick as a common Boa of twenty- 

 four. After skinning this snake I could easily 

 get my head into his mouth, as the singular 

 formation of the jaws admits of wonderful ex- 

 tension. 



A Dutch friend of mine, by name Brouwer, killed 

 a boa, twenty-two feet long, with a pair of stag's 

 horns in his mouth : he had swallowed the stag, 

 but could not get the horns down ; so he had 

 to wait in patience with that uncomfortable 

 mouthful till his stomach digested the body, and 

 then the horns would drop out. In this plight 

 the Dutchman found him as he was going in his 

 canoe up the river, and sent a ball through 

 his head. 



On ascertaining the size of the serpent which 

 the negro had just found, I retired slowly the 

 way I came, and promised four dollars to the 

 negro who had shown it to me, and one to the 



p 



