226, NARRATIVE OF AN 



CHAP, till finally nothing more was feen than the hinder feet 

 ^' ^^^^ ^ and claws, which were at laft difengaged from the twig, 

 and the ix)or creature was fwallowed whole by fu6tion 

 down the throat of his formidable adverfary, whence 

 he was drawn fome inches farther down the alimentary 

 canal, and at laft ftuck, forming a knob or knot at 

 leaft fix times as thick as the fnake, whofe jaws and 

 throat immediately contraded and re-alTiimed their for- 

 mer natural fliape. The fnake being out of our reach, 

 we could not kill him, as we wifhed to do, to take a 

 further examination. Thus we left him, continuing 

 in the fame attitude without moving, and twifled round 

 the branch. 



On the third of November, one party of the troops be- 

 ing arrived, and encamped on the fouth-weft fide of the 

 Cormoetibo Creek, about one mile above the mouth of 

 the Wana Creek, I went with a couple of rangers to pay 

 them a vifit ; when Major Rughcop, the commanding of;- 

 ficer, informed me that Colonel Fourgeoud had marched 

 laft from Patamaca in two columns, of which he led the 

 one, while the other was hourly expedted ; and that th® 

 reft of the regiment was divided between the rivers Cot- 

 tica, Perica, and Comewina, excepting thofe that were 

 fick in the hofpital at Paramaribo. I was now in excel* 

 lent health and good fpirits ; and in the hopes of being 

 reconciled to Fourgeoud by this voluntary proof of my 

 zeal for the fervice, I returned to the rangers' camp to 

 wait his arrival. I was indeed well acquainted with his 



irreconcileable 



