[273] It must be remembered that it is with a blow of its powerful tail that the alligator stuns its prey and knocks it into the water (when any stray animal approaches the bank), and it is with the tail that the dragon, in the fable related by Ælian, chastises, although gently, its mistress, and constricts, according to Pliny, the elephant in its folds. [274] _Nineteenth Century_, March 1877, p. 20. Article on "Authority in Matters of Opinion," by G. Cornewall Lewis. Reviewed by W. E. Gladstone. [275] From the _Daheim_, No. 17, Supplement. January 27th, 1883. Leipzig. [276] 41° Fahrenheit. [277] _A Collection of Voyages_, in 4 volumes. J. J. Knapton, London, 1729. [278] _A Voyage to the East Indies_, by Francis Leguat. London, 1708. [279] I find the following note in _Maclean's Guide to Bombay_, for 1883: "Since the first edition of this Gazette was published, Captain Dundas, of the P. and O. Company's steamer _Cathay_, has informed me that the statements of old travellers regarding these serpents are quite accurate. The serpents are not seen excepting during the south-west monsoon the season in which alone voyages used to be made to India. In Horsburgh's _Sailing Directions_, shipmasters are warned to look out for the serpents, whose presence is a sign that the ship is close to land. Captain Dundas says that the serpents are yellow or copper-coloured. The largest ones are farthest out to sea. They lie on the surface of the water, and appear too lazy even to get out of a steamer's way." [280] The _Romance of Natural History_, P. H. Gosse, F.R.S., First Series, London, 1880, 12th edition; Second Series, 1875, 5th edition. [281] "At length, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, they were thrown open for examination by the desire which then existed in Germany to possess the _ebur fossile_, or 'unicorn's horn,' a supposed infallible specific for the cure of many diseases. The unicorn horn was to be found in the caves, and the search for it revealed the remains of lions, hyænas, elephants, and many other tropical and strange animals." _Pop. Sci. Monthly_, No. 32. [282] Book iv. ch. cxci. and cxcii. [283] Book ii. ch. ii. § 8. [284] Book viii. ch. xxxii. [285] Book xi. ch. cvi. [286] _Ibid._ [287] Ælian, _De Naturâ Animalium_, Book xvi. ch. xx. [288] _De Bello Gallico_, ch. ii. p. 26. [289] _Vide_ Charton's _Voyageurs du Moyen Ages_, vol. ii. p. 25. [290] Harris' _Voyages_, vol. i. p. 362; "Africa," by John Leo. [291] Pinkerton's _Voyages_, vol. i. p. 392; "Ethiopia," by Jobus Ludolphus. [292] _The Navigation and Voyage of Lewes Vertomannus, of Rome, into Arabia, Egypt, &c., in 1503_, contained in "_The History of Travayle in the East and West Indies_," done into English by Richard Eden. London, 1577. [293] Berynto, a city on the seacoast of Syria, Phœnicia. [294] Sining is on the western frontier of Kansuh, towards Kokonor. [295] Pinkerton's _Voyages_, vol. xv. p. 23. [296] Pinkerton's _Voyages_, vol. vii. p. 333.