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JJ^oetrjn EDUCATION. The Lion o'er his wild domain, Roles by the terror of his cyc^ The Eagle <j? the rock retains, By force, his Empire in the sky ; *The Shark the iy rant of the flood, Pursues his prey with quenchless rage, Parent and young, utiwean'd from bkx>d, Are still the same from age to age. Of all that live and move and breath, Man only rises o'er his birth ; He iooks above, around, beneath-* At onctrthc heir of Heaven and Earth. Force, cunning, speed, which nature ga*#, The various tribes throughout her plan, Live to preserve, from death to sa>*c ? These aro the lou-tut powers ot man. From strength to strength he travels on, He leaves the lingering brute behina ; And when a few short vears ure go..e, He soars a disembodied mind, Destined his future course sublime T h rough nobler, better path?1, to run, ? With him the certain end of time, Is but eternity begun. What aids him in this high pursuit. Opens, illumines, checrs the way, Discerns the immortal from the brute ? God's image from the mould of clay ? *'Tis Knowledge /?Knowledge to the soul Is power, and Ijbcrty and peace, And, while celestial ages roll, The joys of knowledge shall increase. Aid then the generous plan which spreads, - The ligfct with universal beams, And through the human <}esert lrads Truthrs living, pure, perpetual streams, Behold ! a new creation rise, Kew spirit breathed into the clo'd'y White'er the voice of Wisdom cries ? k Man knowr thyself, and fear thy God! | From the Tclrtco/ic* % A MONSTROUS SERPENT. An account of the Anaconda, a monstrous species of serpent in the East-Indie*, and of the manner j of its seizing and managing its prey, in a Utter from an English gentle man, many years resident there. Sortie years since the comfnand of my directors carrying me to Ceylon, to transact an affair of no little consequence, I had an apart ment prepared for me on the skirts of the principal town facing the woods : at some distance from my windows there stood some large palm tree*, that afforded me a de lightful prospect. One tnorning as I wai 'iqgjcir.g at these trees, I taw, as I tqpight, a large arm of one of them in strange commotion, bending and twisting about, though there was no' wind, and often strik ing one end to the garth, and then raising it again, and loosing it among the leaves. I was gazing at thi$ wj|i&reat amazement, when a Ceyloneae coining in, 1 begged him to look and wonder with nfc i he looked, sir, and was much more amazed and terrified than I ; in shbrt a paleness overspread his face, and he seemed almost sinking to the earth with terror He begged me to bar up all my doors ; then told me that1 what appeared the arm of a tree to me, was in reality a ser pent of that monstrous size, divert ing* itself there with its various coa tortions, and ne w and then darting down tp thc earth, for it* prey. "I soon found out the truth of what he told' me and looking more nearly, saw it seize a small animal before me, and take it into the tree* Inquiring after this miracle, the Ceyloneze told me that the won der was only that the creature was so near us, for it was a ser|>eiu but too well known in the inland parts and woods, where it often dropped down from the covert of a large tree, aittl devoured a traveller alive. A relation so strange as this could never have gained credit with me, but that 1 actually saw ihe creature, from its size, capablc of doing more than was related. It contin ued diverting it. elf till we assembled ? body twelve of u>, to go 0:1 horseback v.cll armed to destroy him. We rode near- the place, but nv>t to expose ourselves to danger ; we rode behind a thicket,, from nv hence we might unseen level our fire- arms at him j but when we arrived there, we found him so much larger than we had conceived^ that we wished ourselves at home again, and for a long time we dared not tire. ? We had now time to ob serve the creature * and believe me, 1 sir, all the descriptions of monsters 1 ~o[ this kind hitherto given, are tri fles to what we saw in him. The - Ceyloneze all declared that he was - much larger than any they had ever seen, and such a mixture or horror and beauty together, no eye but that which saw it can conceive. The creature was mcie tn^n as thick as a slender man's waist, yet seemed far from fat, and very long !? proportion to his thickness: of ten hanging himself by the tail, from the highest boughs of the tree, and reaching the ground with his head. He was surprisingly nimble, and was now diverting himself in the heat of the day with a thousand gambols round the branches of the tree, and would sometime come down and twist his tail ronnd the bottom ot the trunk, throwing himself to his whole length all round it. In the midst of one of these gambols, we were surprised to see him, all of a sud den spring up into the tree, but the cause goon appeared j an animal of the fox kind, which the serpent had seen coming towards him, he took his way to be pic pared for him, He darted down upon the unwary creature, and sucked him in a few j minutes, then licking his chops I with a irond double tongue of a 1 blackish color, laid himself at his ea*e at length upon the ground ; but his tail still twisted round the tree. In this posture I had an oppor tunity with horror yet with admi ration to b.hold him. He was covered with scales like a croco dile 5 his head was green, with a large black spot in the middle and a yellow streak round the jiws ; he had a yellow circle of a gold co lor round his neck. His sides were of an olive color, and back more beautiful than can he describ ed ; his head was very flat but extremely broad, and his eyes mon strously large, and very bright and terrible. When he moved about in the sun, he was, if possible, | a thousand times move beautiful | than before, the color* according to~j jhe several shades of ifeht, pre- I sent.ng a vast variety of hues, in many places looking like our changeable color* in silk. We all aimed our pieces nt him as he lay and fired at his head once ? but whether he accidentally moved just at the time or oin fears made us take "uud sighr, we either misled him or sever hurt him* for he took no no tice of it ; and after a council of war v e all agreed to make no further attempt upon him a: that time, i but to go home and return with a stronger party next day. TheCey- i loneze seemed to know the erea- | ture well -9 they called it Anaconda, and talked 6f eating its flesh when they ctoghc it, as the.y hid no small hope* of this ; for they say when one of those creature.* c hotel a tree for his dwelling, he seldom quits it for along time. K detaintd iny company to dine with me, and the afternoon was spent in relating rhe amazing things which one or other of th? company hat! seen of these ?ort of monsters ; in short, they told abundance of things that far out V. # went my credulity; but what we saw the next day as much exceeded all they had told me, as what they had tokl me seemed to exceed truth and probability. It seems the custom of this en arure is to lie in wait for its prey, by hiding in the boughs of lar^e trees, from which it unexpectedly drops upon the crcaL^rc uo/ote u sees an ene-* my ; bu: the instance ue saw of this, ' | I must relate to you. The next | morning, si assembled ro the | number of \6o+ it the same thick et, where we had the pleasure {tf I ciare call ic so) to .find our enemy at his old post. He seemed very fierce and very hungry this morn Iflg, and wc sOon sa\65$e effect of it. Th^re are great plenty of tigers in that country ; and one of the^g, of a monstrous size, not less than t common hciirr, as he went along, came at length under the serpent's tree, and swift as thought the ser pent dropped upon him, seizing him across the hark a little below the shoulders, with his horrible mouth, and taking in a \ iece of his. back bigger than a man's head ; the creature roared with agony, and to our unspeakable terror, was run ning with his eneipy towards us ; his court#, however, was soon slop ped, for his nimble adversary wind ing hi^ body three or four times round the boJv of his prey, gird ed him so violently, that he soon fell down in agony. The moment the serpent had fixed his folds, he let go i he back'^f the creature and rai mg and twinflk round its head opened horrid mouth to its full extern, and seized the whole face of the ti^er in it, biting and grind ing him in a horrid manner, and at once choaking and tearing him in pieces. The tiger reaied uu again on this, and words are. too poor to paint his seeming - agony ; he writhed and tossed about, but'all in vain, hisenemy wherever he went was with him, and a hollow roar ing from within the devourers mouth -v as dreadful beyond rxpres , sion. I was for firing on the creature in rliis state but they^Jl declared against-kj. they laid metney kuew.hu , customs so welU that they were now very sure of him without any trouble or hazard, if they let him alone ; but if they disturbed him in this condition, he would be so outrageous, that several of their lives would assuredly pay the for feit.-? Thev, seemed to know" so well what they were about, that I readily acquiesced. ? Several of us spent the whole day in observing this sight ; and surely the agonies of the tiger were beyond all that can be conceived, and his death more horrid than a thousand other ( deaths with ail their torture put to gether. The tiger was a strong and fierce crearure, though unable to hurt or get rid of his cruel ene my, yet gave him a world of trou ble ; a hundred times would he rear up and run a little way, but soon fall down again, partly oppo sed by the weight, and partly by the wreathid twists of the serpent round his body j but though he fell he was far from being con , que red. After some hours he seemed much spent* and lay as if dead ; and the serpent who had many times girted himself violently round him, attempted to break his bone?? ? but in vain, now Jet go his hold, and twisting his tail only round the ti gers urck, who was now in no con dition either to resist or escape, he made towards the tree, (Jigging with some p*ins the ti^cr after him. Nature, it seems informs this ani mal, that though it ran conquer f?uch large creatures a* (hese, it run by no means devour tH*ein as tney are, as their bodies are too thick for bis swallow, and he must therefore L^^alt their bones, and reduce them to a toft tnass before lie can manage them. lTiis he usually does at we saw him attempt it on the tiger, by girting hit body very firmly and hard round them, by this means crushing them to pieces ; hue when his method will not do, he has re- I course to the (We, as we now had I an opportunity to observe. He dragged the tyger by degrees after I him to the tree, and the creature being almost dead, unable to standi he seized hiavslightly a second eme by l e back, .vvi scr K--? M * Ir-gs agnrjst the trunk of - V trrr ;rStfly v-"din? hody ^ J ^-^rand rhe tree se veral tnrrs, h, ft;rtcJ M ? bo p*?l C> tii,d-nbwndoth. bones began t , give way, ,nd bv lgP?te J actt-n1{,ts or this kind, he _ or fivt d"P,lC^|la(' m ^0tIr 01 five different places this took ture all t?'" hoj.r.$' a t!><" poor crea ture all this while was living, anil .it j , ?? frack ?f the bones gave i rhow|, though not so loud, yet ,,itc natural at-fclTl '?nn.d ribs' the 2E ? i ' '|,r " 111 theiiinf roani t, k 1 I pr0Vcd so d.fficulc . f.ti V, ff nionstt'r' tire.! with coflV ',::r *""? l is l?V ^ no ^ ; T ?f .fs"I,inS. l<ft him fat r^.- ' f at.tf'c foot o: the tree, and t?ed into it himself" to rest; im,n ass or VVC ",e,U home> and I ?"?!>. rt 1 could not sleep for the poor tiger, who was naturally, so ?>trong, that we left him alive, tho* mangled this miserable manner. in the morning 1 returned with | seveiai others to the thicket; but rL^C rCXiC IJ,>> wc 3aw a str.uigc I angf ; the body of the tiger which ! bur i!? l Agr< t0 6C knoWn " s"ch/ but looked like a red lump of shape !f;" mar7' ?? dragged to some di tance from the tree, and shone as covered with glue or jelly . whe* wr arrived, we saw plainly the mean ig of this, the snake was yctbuiicd about It. _He had laid, the ]?<>* one by one close to the body, and was now placing the head straight before, ?and licking the body (which had no remaining shape of one,) and co vered it wiui its slaver, which wa* what gave n that shining, look ? o>atnm_? over l,ke a jelly, and ren deung ic fit for swallowing; and laving prepared it to his mind, seized the head, and began to suck V"? af;e.rwards ^e body, in his ! I u Was ? worlcofso much i me, that l .cfc him struggling at The shoulders whenl went home to dinner, and by the account of those that stayed to watch him, it wan nignt before he got it all in. Next morning we all assembled tor the last time, and the very women followed us, saying, that aa the prey was gorged, there v/as no danger. J could by ?? means conceive chc meaning of this, till I came Co the ? place, but then I found it very true s tne serpent had so loaded his belly, tlftt he could not fight nor runaway. He Attempted on our approach to climb up the tree, but ia Vain, and was soon knocked in tfit heii with staves We measured him, and hi, length was thirty-three feet four inches. He was soon cut upt and I assure; you, sir, afforded a fieafe c whiter than veal, and as tl.ty said that eat of it, finer than anf flesh whatever. ? . .^STw. ' 1 ltol,c t,te curiott nature of this account will plead 'pardoa for its kngch.^- - ... . CHINESE ftmiK ' * In the late Knglish negotiation with the Chinese monarch, of which lord Amherst was the envoy, it ap pears that the whole plan was de feated, bccause his lordship refused to present him elf on his knees, and bang his head nine time* on the ground in token of his submission. If the Englihh minsitry has chosen a two year old Ram, instead of his lordship, as an envoy, he would have accommodated the Chinese monarch, with a quantum sufficitof bangs from an head nearly as hard as his own. ? Fed. Rep . Melanchly 4cctdent.~?-Ot\ the morning of tjie ioth inst. a young man named John Pope, son of Mr, hJisha Pope, of this county, iiav ing roue out alone; was thrown by his horse against a tree with the most fatal violence. Me died th< ? f ? r y> T same evening. ? Rale:gh Minerva.