176 CHAP. VII.
NARRATIVE
OF
AN
having twilled itself by the help of its claws, fo that the creature cannot efcape, it breaks, by its irresistible force, every bone in the animal's body, which it then covers over with a kind of slime or flaver from its mouth, to make it slide; and at last gradually fucks it in, till it disappears : after this, the aboma cannot shist its situation, on account of the great knob or knot which the swallowed prey occasions in that part of the body where it rests till it is digested; for till then it would hinder the snake from Riding along the ground. During that time the aboma wants no other subsistence.' I have been told of negroes being devoured by this animal, and am difpofed to credit the account; for should they chance to come within its reach when hungry, it would as certainly feize them as any other animal. I do not apprehend that its flesh, which is very white, and looks like that of fish, is in any respect pernicious to the stomach. I lhould have had no objection to the negroes eating it till it was confumed, had I not obferved a kind of dissatisfaction among the remaining marines, who would not have been pleafed with my giving the negroes the ufe of the kettle to boil it. The bite of this fnake is faid not to be venomous; nor do I believe it bites at all from any other impulfe than hunger. I shall only add, that having nailed its skin on the bottom of the canoe, and dried it in the fun, fprinkling it over with wood-ashes to prevent it from corruption, I fent