National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
| |||||||||
|
The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
CHAP. XLIX. SERPENT TRAPPING
77
about ten palms in girth. They have two forelegs near
the head, but for foot nothing but a claw like the claw of
a hawk or that of a lion. The head is very big, and the
eyes are bigger than a great loaf of bread. The mouth
is large enough to swallow a man whole, and is garnished
with great [pointed] teeth. And in short they are so
fierce-looking and so hideously ugly, that every man and
beast must stand in fear and trembling of them. There
are also smaller ones, such as of eight paces long, and of
five, and of one pace only.
The way in which they are caught is this. You must
know that by day they live underground because of the
great heat, and in the night they go out to feed, and
devour every animal they can catch. They go also to
drink at the rivers and lakes and springs. And their
weight is so great that when they travel in search of food
or drink, as they do by night, the tail makes a great
furrow in the soil as if a full ton of liquor had been
dragged along. Now the huntsmen who go after them
take them by certain gyn which they set in the track over
which the serpent has past, knowing that the beast will
come back the same way. They plant a stake deep in the
ground and fix on the head of this a sharp blade of steel
made lake a razor or a lance-point, and then they cover
the whole with sand so that the serpent cannot see it.
Indeed the huntsman plants several such stakes and
blades on the track. On coming to the spot the beast
strikes against the iron blade with such force that it
enters his breast and rives him up to the navel, so that
be dies on the spot [and the crows on seeing the brute
dead begin to caw, and then the huntsmen know that
the serpent is dead and come in search of him].
This then is the way these beasts are taken. Those
who take them proceed to extract the gall from the
inside, and this sells at a great price ; for you must know
|
Copyright (C) 2003-2019 National Institute of Informatics and The Toyo Bunko. All Rights Reserved.