Kitabı oku: «Mythical Monsters», sayfa 9

“But chiefly the larger serpents are upon guard there, and defend the accesses of the lake. Not an hour passes without some dreadful combat, but the serpent, defended by its scales, and naturally capable of sustaining a multitude of wounds, is of all others the most formidable. It is the most wakeful also, for the whole tribe sleep with their eyes open, and are consequently for ever upon the watch; so that, till their rapacity is satisfied, few other animals will venture to approach their station.”

We read of a serpent exhibited in the time of Augustus at Rome, which, Suetonius tells us, “was fifty cubits in length.”¹⁶⁷ But at the present day there are few authentic accounts of snakes exceeding thirty feet in length; and there are some people who discredit any which profess to speak of snakes of greater dimensions than this. There are some, however, among the annexed stories, which I think demand belief, and apparently we may conclude that the python and boa exceptionally attain as much as forty feet in length, or even more.

Wallace¹⁶⁸ merely reports by hearsay that the pythons in the Phillipines, which destroy young cattle, are said to reach more than forty feet.

Captain Sherard Osborn,¹⁶⁹ in his description of Quedah in the Malay peninsula, says, also, as a matter of popular belief: “The natives of Tamelan declared most of them to be of the boa-constrictor species, but spoke of monsters in the deep forests, which might, if they came out, clear off the whole village. A pleasant feat, for which Jadie, with a wag of his sagacious head, assured me that an ‘oular Bessar’ or big snake was quite competent.

“It was strange but interesting to find amongst all Malays a strong belief in the extraordinary size to which the boa-constrictors or pythons would grow; they all maintained that in the secluded forests of Sumatra or Borneo, as well as on some of the smaller islands which were not inhabited, these snakes were occasionally found of forty or fifty feet in length.”

Major McNair says¹⁷⁰: “One of the keenest sportsmen in Singapore gives an account of a monster that he encountered. He had wounded a boar in the jungle, and was following its tracks with his dogs, when, in penetrating further into the forest, he found the dogs at bay, and, advancing cautiously, prepared for another shot at the boar; to his surprise, however, he found that the dogs were baying a huge python, which had seized the boar, thrown its coils round the unfortunate beast, and was crushing it to death. A well-directed shot laid the reptile writhing on the ground, and it proved to be about thirty feet long. But such instances of extreme length are rare.”

Unfortunately the exciting story of a serpent, between forty and fifty feet in length, which I extract from the North China Daily News of November 10th, 1880, the scene of which is also laid in the Malay peninsula, lacks the authenticity of the narrator’s name. It is as follows: —

“The Straits Times tells the following exciting python story: ‘A sportsman, who a few days ago penetrated into the jungle lying between Buddoh and Sirangoon, came upon a lone hut in a district called Campong Batta, upon the roof of which the skin of an enormous boa or python (whichever may be the correct name) was spread out. The hut was occupied by a Malay and his wife, from whom our informant gathered the following extraordinary account. One night, about a week previously, the Malay was awakened by the cries of his wife for assistance. Being in perfect darkness, and supposing the alarm to be on account of thieves, he seized his sharp parang, and groped his way to her sleeping place, where his hand fell upon a slimy reptile. It was fully a minute before he could comprehend the entire situation, and when he did, he discovered that the whole of his wife’s arm had been drawn down the monster’s throat, whither the upper part of her body was slowly but surely following. Not daring to attack the monster at once for fear of causing his wife’s death, the husband, with great presence of mind, seized two bags within reach, and commenced stuffing them into the corner of the snake’s jaws, by means of which he succeeded in forcing them wider open and releasing his wife’s arm. No sooner had the boa lost his prey than he attacked the husband, whom he began encircling in his fatal coils; but holding out both arms, and watching his opportunity, he attacked the monster so vigorously with his parang that it suddenly unwound itself and vanished through an opening beneath the attap sides of the hut. His clothes were covered with blood, as was also the floor of the hut, and his wife’s arm was blue with the squeezing it received between the boa’s jaws. At daylight the husband discovered his patch of plaintain trees nearly ruined, where the boa, writhing in agony, had broken off the trees at the roots, and in the midst of the debris lay the monster itself, dead. The Malay assured our informant that he had received no less than sixty dollars from Chinese, who came from long distances to purchase pieces of the flesh on account of its supposed medical properties, and that he had refused six dollars for the skin, which he preferred to retain as a trophy. It was greatly decomposed, having been some days exposed in the open air, and useless for curing. There is no telling what may have been the measurement of this large reptile, but the skin, probably greatly stretched by unskilful removal, measured between seven and eight fathoms.’”

Bontius speaks of serpents in the Asiatic Isles. “The great ones,” he says, “sometimes exceed thirty-six feet; and have such capacity of throat and stomach that they swallow whole boars.”

Mr. McLeod, in the Voyage of the Alceste, states that during a captivity of some months at Whidah, on the coast of Africa, he had opportunities of observing serpents double this length.¹⁷¹

Broderip, in his Leaves from the Note-book of a Naturalist (Parker, 1852), speaks of a serpent thirty feet in length, which attacked the crew of a Malay proa anchored for the night close to the island of Celebes.

Mr. C. Collingwood in Rambles of a Naturalist, states that “Mr. Low assured me that he had seen one [python] killed measuring twenty-six feet, and I heard on good authority of one of twenty-nine feet having been killed there. In Borneo they were said to attain forty feet, but for this I cannot vouch.”

That large pythons still exist in South and Western China, although of very reduced dimensions as compared with those described in ancient works, is affirmed by many writers, from whom I think it is sufficient to extract a notice by one of the early missionaries who explored that country.

“Pour ce qui est des serpens qu’on trouve dans Chine l’Atlas raconte que la Province de Quansi, en produit de si grands et d’une longueur si extrême, qu’il est presque incroyable; et il nous assure, qu’il s’en est trouvé, qui étaient plus longs que ne seraient pas dix perches attachées les unes avec les autres, c’est-à-dire, qu’ils avaient plus de trente pieds géométriques. Flore Sienois dit, ‘Gento est le plus grand de tous ceux qui sont dans les provinces de Quansi, de Haynan, et de Quantun … il dévore les cerfs… Il s’élève droit sur sa queue, et combat vigoureusement, en cette posture, contre les hommes et les bêtes farouches.’”¹⁷²

We have unfortunately no clue to the actual length of the serpent Bomma, described by J. M. da Sorrento in A Voyage to Congo in 1682, contained in Churchill’s collection of voyages published in 1732.¹⁷³ “The flesh they eat is generally that of wild creatures, and especially of a sort of serpent called Bomma. At a certain feast in Baia, I observed the windows, instead of tapestry and arras, adorned with the skin of these serpents as wide as that of a large ox, and long in proportion.”

That harmless snakes of from twelve to fourteen feet in length occur abundantly in Northern Australia is generally known; but it is only of late years that I have been made acquainted with a firm belief, entertained by the natives in the interior, of the existence near the junction of the Darling and Murray, south of the centre of the continent, of a serpent of great magnitude.

I learn from Mr. G. R. Moffat that on the Lower Murray, between Swan Hill and the Darling junction – at the time of his acquaintance with the district (about 1857 to 1867) – the black fellows had numerous stories of the existence of a large serpent in the Mallee scrub. It was conspicuous for its size, thirty to forty feet in length, and especially for its great girth, swiftness, and intensely disgusting odour; this latter, in fact, constituted the great protection from it, insomuch as it would be impossible to approach without recognising its presence.

Mr. Moffatt learnt personally from a Mr. Beveridge, son of Mr. Peter Beveridge, of Swan Hill station, that he had actually seen one, and that his account quite tallied with those of the blacks. In answer to an inquiry which I addressed to Australia, I received the note attached below.¹⁷⁴

Mr. Henry Liddell, who was resident on the Darling River in 1871-72, informs me that he has heard from stock-riders and ration-carriers similar accounts to that of Mr. Moffatt, with reference to the existence of large serpents of the boa species in an adjacent locality, viz. the tract of country lying to the east of Darling and Murray junction, in the back country belonging to Pooncaira station.

They described them as being numerous, in barren and rocky places, among big boulders; fully forty feet long; as thick as a man’s thigh; and as having the same remarkable odour described by Mr. Moffatt. They spoke of them as quite common, and not at all phenomenal, between Wentworth and Pooncaira.

The Anaconda, in regard to which so much myth and superstition prevails among the Indians of Brazil, is thus spoken of by Condamine, in his Travels in South America. “The most rare and singular of all is a large amphibious serpent from twenty-five to thirty feet long and more than a foot thick, according to report. It is called Jacumama, or ‘the mother of the waters,’ by the Americans of Maynas, and commonly inhabits the large lakes formed by the river-water after flood.”¹⁷⁵

Ulloa, also, in his Voyage to South America,¹⁷⁶ says: “In the countries watered by that vast river (the Maranon) is bred a serpent of a frightful magnitude, and of a most deleterious nature. Some, in order to give an idea of its largeness, affirm that it will swallow any beast whole, and that this has been the miserable end of many a man. But what seems still a greater wonder is the attractive quality attributed to its breath,¹⁷⁷ which irresistibly draws any creature to it which happens to be within the sphere of its attraction. The Indians call it Jacumama, i. e. ‘mother of water’; for, as it delights in lakes and marshy places, it may in some sense be considered as amphibious. I have taken a great deal of pains to inquire into this particular, and all I can say is that the reptile’s magnitude is really surprising.”

John Nieuhoff, in his Voyages to Brazil,¹⁷⁸ speaking of the serpent Guaku or Liboya, says: “It is questionless the biggest of all serpents, some being eighteen, twenty-four, nay thirty feet long, and of the thickness of a man in his middle. The Portuguese call it Kobra Detrado, or the roebuck serpent, because it will swallow a whole roebuck, or any other deer it meets with; after they have swallowed such a deer, they fall asleep, and so are catched. Such a one I saw at Paraiba, which was thirty feet long, and as big as a barrel. This serpent, being a very devouring creature, greedy of prey, leaps from amongst the hedges and woods, and standing upright upon its tail, wrestles both with men and wild beasts; sometimes it leaps from the trees upon the traveller, whom it fastens upon, and beats the breath out of his body with its tail.”

The largest (water boa) ever met with by a European appears to be that described by a botanist, Dr. Gardiner, in his Travels in Brazil. It had devoured a horse, and was found dead, entangled in the branches of a tree overhanging a river, into which it had been carried by a flood; it was nearly forty feet long.

Winged Serpents

The next section relates to winged serpents, a belief in which was prevalent in early ages, and is strongly supported by several independent works.

Fig. 35. – Egyptian Four-winged Serpent, Chanuphis, or Bait.

(From “Serpent Myths of Ancient Egypt,” by W. R. Cooper.)

To my mind, Herodotus speaks without the slightest doubt upon the subject in the following passages. “Arabia¹⁷⁹ is the last of inhabited lands towards the south, and it is the only country which produces frankincense, myrrh, cassia, cinnamon, and ledanum.” “The frankincense they procure by means of the gum styrax, which the Greeks get from the Phœnicians. This they burn, and thereby obtain the spice; for the trees which bear the frankincense are guarded by winged serpents, small in size, and of various colours, whereof vast numbers hang about every tree. They are of the same kind as the serpents that invade Egypt, and there is nothing but the smoke of the styrax which will drive them from the trees.”

Fig. 36. – The Symbolic Winged Serpent of the GoddessMersokar or Melsokar. (After W. R. Cooper.)

Again,¹⁸⁰ “the Arabians say that the whole world would swarm with these serpents, if they were not kept in check, in the way in which I know that vipers are.” “Now, with respect to the vipers and the winged snakes of Arabia, if they increased as fast as their nature would allow, impossible were it for man to maintain himself upon the earth. Accordingly, it is found that when the male and female come together, at the very moment of impregnation, the female seizes the male by the neck, and having once fastened cannot be brought to leave go till she has bit the neck entirely through, and so the male perishes; but after a while he is avenged upon the female by means of the young, which, while still unborn, gnaw a passage through the womb and then through the belly of their mother. Contrariwise, other snakes, which are harmless, lay eggs and hatch a vast number of young. Vipers are found in all parts of the world, but the winged serpents are nowhere seen except in Arabia, where they are all congregated together; this makes them appear so numerous.”

Herodotus had so far interested himself in ascertaining the probability of their existence as to visit Arabia for the purpose of inquiry; he says,¹⁸¹ “I went once to a certain place in Arabia, almost exactly opposite the city of Buto, to make inquiries concerning the winged serpents. On my arrival I saw the back-bones and ribs of serpents in such numbers as it is impossible to describe; of the ribs there were a multitude of heaps, some great, some small, some middle-sized. The place where the bones lie is at the entrance of a narrow gorge between steep mountains, which there open upon a spacious plain communicating with the great plains of Egypt. The story goes, that with the spring the snakes come flying from Arabia towards Egypt, but are met in this gorge by the birds called ibises, who forbid their entrance and destroy them all. The Arabians assert, and the Egyptians also admit, that it is on account of the service thus rendered that the Egyptians hold the ibis in so much reverence.” He further¹⁸² describes the winged serpent as being shaped like the water-snake, and states that its wings are not feathered, but resemble very closely those of the bat.

Fig. 37. – The Symbolic Winged Serpent of theGoddess Eileithya. (After W. R. Cooper.)

Aristotle briefly states, as a matter of common report, that there were in his time winged serpents in Ethiopia.¹⁸³ Both two and four winged snakes are depicted among the Egyptian sculptures, considered by Mr. Cooper to be emblematic of deities, and to signify that the four corners of the earth are embraced and sheltered by the supreme Providence.

Josephus¹⁸⁴ unmistakably affirms his belief in the existence of flying serpents, in his account of the stratagem which Moses adopted in attacking the Ethiopians, who had invaded Egypt and penetrated as far as Memphis. From this we may infer that in his time flying serpents were by no means peculiar to Arabia, but, as might have been expected, equally infested the desert lands bordering the fertile strip of the Nile.

In Whiston’s translation we read that “Moses prevented the enemies, and took and led his army before those enemies were apprised of his attacking them; for he did not march by the river, but by land, where he gave a wonderful demonstration of his sagacity; for when the ground was difficult to be passed over, because of the multitude of serpents (which it produces in vast numbers, and indeed is singular in some of those productions, which other countries do not breed, and yet such as are worse than others in power and mischief, and an unusual fierceness of sight, some of which ascend out of the ground unseen, and also fly in the air, and so come upon men at unawares, and do them a mischief), Moses invented a wonderful stratagem to preserve the army safe and without hurt; for he made baskets, like unto arks, of sedge, and filled them with ibes, and carried them along with them; which animal is the greatest enemy to serpents imaginable, for they fly from them when they come near them; and as they fly they are caught and devoured by them, as if it were done by the harts; but the ibes are tame creatures, and only enemies to the serpentine kind; but about these ibes I say no more at present, since the Greeks themselves are not unacquainted with this sort of bird. As soon, therefore, as Moses was come to the land, which was the breeder of these serpents, he let loose the ibes, and by their means repelled the serpentine kind, and used them for his assistants before the army came upon that ground.”

These statements of Herodotus and Josephus are both too precise to be explicable on the theory that they refer to the darting or jumping serpents which Nieuhoff describes, in his day, as infesting the palm trees of Arabia and springing from tree to tree; or to the jaculus of Pliny,¹⁸⁵ which darts from the branches of trees, and flies through the air as though it were hurled by an engine, and which is described by Ælian and graphically figured by Lucan¹⁸⁶ in the passage – “Behold! afar, around the trunk of a barren tree, a fierce serpent – Africa calls it the jaculus – wreathes itself, and then darts forth, and through the head and pierced temples of Paulus it takes its flight: nothing does venom there effect, death seizes him through the wound. It was then understood how slowly fly the stones which the sling hurls, how sluggishly whizzes the flight of the Scythian arrow.”

Solinus, whose work, Polyhistor, is mainly a compilation from Pliny’s Natural History, gives a similar account of the swarms of winged serpents about the Arabian marshes, and states that their bite was so deadly that death followed the bite before pain could be felt; he also refers to their destruction by the ibises, and is probably only quoting other authors rather than speaking of his own knowledge.

Cicero, again, speaks of the ibis as being a very large bird, with strong legs, and a horny long beak, which destroys a great number of serpents, and keeps Egypt free from pestilential diseases, by killing and devouring the flying serpents, brought from the deserts of Lybia by the south-west wind, and so preventing the mischief which might attend their biting while alive, or from any infection when dead.

There are not unfrequent allusions in ancient history to serpents having become so numerous as to constitute a perfect plague; the dreadful mortality caused among the Israelites by the fiery serpents spoken of in Numbers is a case in point, and another¹⁸⁷ is the migration of the Neuri from their own country into that of the Budini, one generation before the attack of Darius, in consequence of the incursion of a huge multitude of serpents. It is stated that some of these were produced in their own country, but for the most part they came in from the deserts of the north. The home of the Neuri appears to have been to the north-west of the Pontus Euxinus, pretty much in the position of Poland, and I believe that at the present day the only harmful reptile occurring in it is the viper common to the rest of Europe. Diodorus Siculus¹⁸⁸ mentions a tradition that the Cerastes had once made an irruption into Egypt in such numbers as to have depopulated a great portion of the inhabited districts.

These stories are interesting as showing a migratory instinct occurring in certain serpents, either periodically or occasionally, and are thus to some extent corroborative of the account of the annual invasion of Egypt by serpents, referred to in a previous page. They also, I think, confirm the impression that serpents were more numerous in the days of early history, and had a larger area of distribution than they have now, and that possibly some species, such as the Arabian and flying serpents, which have since become extinct, then existed. Thus the boa is spoken of by Pliny as occurring commonly in Italy, and growing to such a vast size that a child was found entire in one of them, which was killed on the Vatican Hill during the reign of the Emperor Claudius. Yet at the present day there are no snakes existing there at all corresponding to this description.

Parallel instances of invasions of animals materially affecting the prosperity of man are doubtless familiar to my readers, such as the occasional migration of lemmings, passage of rats, flights of locusts, or the ravages caused by the Colorado beetle; but many are perhaps quite unaware what a terrible plague can be established, in the course of a very few years, by the prolific unchecked multiplication of even so harmless, innocent, and useful an animal as the common rabbit. The descendants of a few imported pairs have laid waste extensive districts of Australia and New Zealand, necessitated an enormous expenditure for their extirpation, and have at the present day¹⁸⁹ caused such a widespread destruction of property in the latter country, that large areas of ground have actually had to be abandoned and entirely surrendered to them.

It is interesting to find in the work of the Arabic geographer El Edrisi a tradition of an island in the Atlantic, called Laca, off the north-west coast of Africa, having been formerly inhabited, but abandoned on account of the excessive multiplication of serpents on it. According to Scaligerus, the mountains dividing the kingdom of Narsinga from Malabar produce many wild beasts, among which may be enumerated winged dragons, who are able to destroy any one approaching their breath.

Megasthenes (tradente Æliano) relates that winged serpents are found in India; where it is stated that they are noxious, fly only by night, and that contact with their urine destroys portions of animals.

Ammianus Marcellinus (who wrote about the fourth century A.D.) states that the ibis is one among the countless varieties of the birds of Egypt, sacred, amiable, and valuable as storing up the eggs of serpents in his nest for food and so diminishing their number. He also refers to their encountering flocks of winged snakes, coming laden with poison from the marshes of Arabia, and overcoming them in the air, and devouring them before they quit their own region. And Strabo,¹⁹⁰ in his geographical description of India, speaks of serpents of two cubits in length, with membraneous wings like bats: “They fly at night, and let fall drops of urine or sweat, which occasions the skins of persons who are not on their guard to putrefy.” Isaiah speaks of fiery flying serpents, the term “fiery” being otherwise rendered in the Alexandrine edition of the Septuagint by θανατοῦντες “deadly,” while the term “fiery” is explained by other authorities as referring to the burning sensation produced by the bite, and to the bright colour of the serpents.¹⁹¹ Collateral evidence of the belief in winged serpents is afforded by incidental allusions to them in the classics. Thus Virgil alludes to snakes with strident wings in the line

 
Illa autem attolit stridentis anguibus alis.¹⁹²
 

Lucan¹⁹³ refers to the winged serpents of Arabia as forming one of the ingredients of an incantation broth brewed by a Thessalian witch, Erictho, with the object of resuscitating a corpse, and procuring replies to the queries of Sextus, son of Pompey. There are other passages in Ovid and other poets, in which the words “winged serpents” are made use of, but which I omit to render here, since from the context it seems doubtful whether they were not intended as poetic appellations of the monster to which, by popular consent, the term dragon has been generally restricted.

I feel bound to refer, although of course without attaching any very great weight of evidence to them, to the numerous stories popular in the East, in which flying serpents play a conspicuous part, the serpents always having something magical or supernatural in their nature. Such tales are found in the entrancing pages of the Arabian Nights, or in the very entertaining folk-lore of China, as given to us by Dr. N. P. Dennys of Singapore.¹⁹⁴

The latest notice of the flying serpent that we find is in a work by P. Belon du Mans, published in 1557, entitled, Portraits de quelques animaux, poissons, serpents, herbes et arbres, hommes et femmes d’Arabie, Égypte, et Asie, observés par P. Belon du Mans. It contains a drawing of a biped winged dragon, with the notice “Portrait du serpent ailé” and the quatrain —

 
Dangereuse est du serpent la nature
Qu’on voit voler près le mont Sinai
Qui ne serait, de la voir, esbahy,
Si on a peur, voyant sa pourtraiture?
 

This is copied by Gesner, who repeats the story of its flying out of Arabia into Egypt.¹⁹⁵ I attach considerable importance to the short extract which I shall give in a future page from the celebrated Chinese work on geography and natural history, the Shan Hai King, or Mountain and Sea Classic. The Shan Hai King claims to be of great antiquity, and, as Mr. Wylie remarks, though long looked on with distrust, has been investigated recently by scholars of great ability, who have come to the conclusion that it is at least as old as the Chow dynasty, and probably older. Now, as the Chow dynasty commenced in 1122 B.C., it is, if this latter supposition be correct, of a prior age to the works of Aristotle, Herodotus, and all the other authors we have been quoting, and therefore is the earliest work on natural history extant, and the description of the flying serpent of the Sien mountains (vide infrà) the earliest record of the existence of such creatures.

Classical Dragon and Mediæval Dragon

While the flying serpents of which we have just treated, will, if we assent to the reality of their former existence, assist greatly in the explanation of the belief in a winged dragon so far as Egypt, Arabia, and adjacent countries are concerned, it seems hardly probable that they are sufficient to account for the wide-spread belief in it. This we have already glanced at; but we now propose to examine it in greater detail, with reference to countries so distant from their habitat as to render it unlikely that their description had penetrated there.

The poets of Greece and Rome introduce the dragon into their fables, as an illustration, when the type of power and ferocity is sought for. Homer, in his description of the shield of Hercules, speaks of “The scaly horror of a dragon coiled full in the central field, unspeakable, with eyes oblique, retorted, that askant shot gleaming fire.” So Hesiod¹⁹⁶ (750 to 700 B.C., Grote), describing the same object, says: “On its centre was the unspeakable terror of a dragon glancing backward with eyes gleaming with fire. His mouth, too, was filled with teeth running in a white line, dread and unapproachable; and above his terrible forehead, dread strife was hovering, as he raises the battle rout. On it likewise were heads of terrible serpents, unspeakable, twelve in number, who were wont to scare the race of men on earth, whosoever chanced to wage war against the son of Jove.”

Here it is noteworthy that Hesiod distinguishes between the dragon and serpents.

Ovid¹⁹⁷ locates the dragon slain by Cadmus in Bœotia, near the river Cephisus. He speaks of it as being hid in a cavern, adorned with crests, and of a golden colour. He, like the other poets, makes special reference to the eyes sparkling with fire, and it may be noted that a similar brilliancy is mentioned by those who have observed pythons in their native condition. He speaks of the dragon as blue,¹⁹⁸ and terribly destructive owing to the possession of a sting, long constricting folds, and venomous breath.

The story of Ceres flying to heaven in a chariot drawn by two dragons, and of her subsequently lending it to Triptolemus, to enable him to travel all over the earth and distribute corn to its inhabitants, is detailed or alluded to by numerous poets, as well as the tale of Medea flying from Jason in a chariot drawn by winged dragons. Ceres¹⁹⁹ is further made to skim the waves of the ocean, much after the fashion of mythical personages depicted in the wood-cuts illustrating passages in the Shan Hai King.²⁰⁰ Ammianus Marcellinus, whose history ends with the death of Valerius in A.D. 378, refers, as a remarkable instance of credulity, to a vulgar rumour that the chariot of Triptolemus was still extant, and had enabled Julian, who had rendered himself formidable both by sea and land, to pass over the walls of, and enter into the city of Heraclea. Though rational explanations are afforded by the theory of Bochart and Le Clerc, that the story is based upon the equivocal meaning of a Phœnician word, signifying either a winged dragon or a ship fastened with iron nails or bolts; or by that of Philodorus, as cited by Eusebius, who says that his ship was called a flying dragon, from its carrying the figure of a dragon on its prow; yet either simply transposes into another phase the current belief in a dragon, without prejudicing it.