Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1883-08-31
THE PYTHON.
A Fine Specimen OF the Terrible and
Beautiful serpent OF the south.

ltlulh ln' l-OnuO1 leleRTdpn.l
In the geological Gardens can now be
seen in all the velvety sheen of Its first
splendor python that has just cast its
skin. and the great snake is n very mira
Gle OF reptiliaM loneliness. Not even the
birds of paradise can compare with its
purples, blues and gold, while an infinite
interest underles those iridescent charms,
from the fact that its coils, soft as but
teriy's wings and shot with colors like q
doves breast, can crush the life out of a
strong man, can hold the tiger in its rage
and slowly squeeze it into q pulp. Watch
its breathing i is as gentle as child's
And the beautiful lamia head rests like II
Drowning Jewel upon the softly heaving
coils. Let danger threaten, however, and
the lightning is hardly quicker than the
dart of those vengeful convolutions. The
cleaning length rustles proudly into
menace, and instead of the vuluptuous
lazy thing Of n moment ago, the python,
with al its terrors complete, erects itself
,iehantly, thrilling, as it seems, with eager
passion in every scale, and measuring in
the air with threatening head the circle
within which is death. Once le. those
recurved fanes strike hane, and though
there is no poison i'll them, all hope is
gone to the victim. Coil after coil is
rapidly thrown round the struggling OBJ
ject and then With slow but relentless
pressure life il throttled out of every
limb. No wonder that the world has al
ways held the serpent in awe, and that
nations should have worshipped and still
worship this emblem Of destruction and
death. Ii is fate itself, swift as disaster
deliberate as rotnbution, inGQp.p. p.ehensi-
BILE MS des,iuy, Gods and heroes alike
acid victory over the snake as the SUI
preme criterion of valor They gradua-
ted to divinity by staying serpents. In
dra and Nlshnu conquer snakes, Hercu-
les and st. George have t..eir hydra,
Apollo his python. 1t is over the body
II Ladon, terrible progeny of a terrible
parentaGe-Typho its father and Echid-
na the dam-that the hero steps to gather
the golden apples, and across the dead
coils of Fafpir that aigurl reaches out
his hand to the treasures of Brunhild on
the glistening heath. What more fearful
in Oriental myth than Vritna, the endless
thing that the gods overcome, or kalinak,
the black death, or Ali, the throttler
Jason and Pcrseus, Feridun and Odin
claim triumph over the snake rs their
chiefest glories, and it would bo telioue
to recapitulate the multitude Of myths
through WHICH 'fthe dire worm" has come
down to our times dignitied and made aw.
ful by the honors aud fears of the past.
The python in the Geological Gardens,
however, though it may stand as the mod
ern reality of the old-world fable of gi-
gantic snake that challenged the strength
of gods to overcome it, presents to nc
only one side of snake nature. at pos
sesses . arrr.ising beauty and prodigious
strength but it is not venomous. Pro-
badly the more subtle and fearful appre-
tensions of men originated really from
the smaller and deadlier ki;.,,,,S, aud were
then by supersIiuon, poetry and heraldry
extended to the larger. The little basi.
lisk crowned king of vipers "the horn
ell cerastes Dire" n few ..inches in length
the tinaspic. fatal as lightning aud ai
switt, and Gle tabled cockatrice, that
man might hold in his hand, lrst mad,
the serpeDt logeal terrible their venom
was afterward transferred. aud not unnat
urally, to the larger species. 1t was til,
small worms that carried in their minut,
angs such rapid and ruthless death
which struck fear into the minds of tn,
ancients and invested the cpa.s with tn
mvsteriogG .nl horr,d attributes wheret,
antiquity, from China to Egypt, hastene,
70 pay honor. OF the venomous snake
the geological Gardens Egeaent man,
yery fearson,e examples, and painful
death, such us science is us yet powerles
TO arrest lurka within half the cases il
the reptile house. Eminent among til
most deadly is the surucuru OF the Bra
zils. Every one knows Of the fatal da
boia of India and the cobra-di capellC
the rattlesnake, the ophiophu6Vs, and Il,
pthef more familiar feptilea with poiso
tdngs, all OF which are to be seen in RI
gents Park but the stranger from Sout
America is their rival in the certainty an
rapidity Of the death that it inflicts.
and the python, therefore, may take ran
as the representatives OF tho two aspec
OF the snake idea in nature,