Tho’ there be no Amphisbænick Animals, there is some Resemblance of it in Plants, whose Cotyledon is always double, and in the common Centre of the two, is a Point or Speck, which is the Plantule, or the Tree in Embryo; which Plantule being acted on by the Earth, warmed by the Sun, begins to expand, and shoots its Root both upward and downward. Thus, in a Bean committed to the Ground, we soon see it to cleave into two Parts, and in the Fissure appears a little Speck, which sends out a Root downwards, and a Bud upwards.—A remarkable Phænomenon, says the Note on Boerhaave’s Theory.
X. Among Serpents, Authors place Dragons; Creatures terrible and fierce in Aspect and Nature. They are divided into Apodes and Pedates, some with Feet, and some without them; some are privileged with Wings, and others are destitute of Wings and Feet: Some are covered with sharp Scales, which make a bright Appearance in some Position. Some have observed, that about the Ganges, are Dragons whose Eyes sparkle like precious Stones.
They differ in external Form: The Draconopades are represented by a human Face, and sightly Countenance; the rest of the Body in a tortuous winding Shape. In one of Dr. Johnson’s Figures, a Dragon is made to appear like a Man’s Face, with a Grenadier’s Cap on the Head. Some differ in Colour, some are black in the upper Part of the Body, according to Philostratus; red, according to Homer; yellow, according to Pausanias; and Lucan makes it a golden Colour[[150]].
[150]. Philostratus de Vita Apol. lib. iii. cap. 2. Homer. Iliad, lib. 12. Lucan. Pharsal. in Jonstoni Historia Serpentum, p. 33, 34.
The same Historian observes, that in the Atlantick Mountains, they kill where they touch, and those that are in the Kingdom of Narsinga, and dwell in the Woods, kill all they meet. Ibid.[[151]]
[151]. Unde quidam in arbores & chamo dracones distinxere.
I presume, the Author means Narsinga, a potent Kingdom, bounded on the East with the Bay of Bengal, that noble Part of India, says Herbert[[152]]; where the Monarch is always attended with 1000 for his Guards, has 5 or 6000 Jesters, and reckons it one of his chief Titles to be the Husband of a Thousand Wives.
[152]. His Travels into Africa and Asia, the famous Empires of Persia and Indostan,—Oriental Islands.
Dragons are Inhabitants of Africa and Asia; those of India exceed most in Largeness and Longitude: In the Tower of London, is the Skin of one, which is of vast Bulk. In Æthiopia, they have no Name for Dragons, but Killers of Elephants, which is supposed to be the largest of Land-Animals.
Over the Water-gate in the City of Rhodes, there is set up the Head of a Dragon, which was 33 Foot long, that wasted all the Country, till it was slain by Deodate de Gozon, one of the Knights of St. John Baptist[[153]]. The Knights of that Order had frequently attack’d it, but in vain; for its Scales being proof against all their Arms, it destroyed so many of them, that the Grand-Master forbad them to engage the Monster any more.