In the backwoods of Thayetmyo district, Burma, in 1886, I was next to
the man who was guiding a party of policemen and villagers going, in
single file, on the track of robbers in arms, who had been
cattle-lifting. Suddenly the guide in front held his hand behind his
back as a signal to stop, and I passed on the signal.
The guide began to move forward, on his toes, as noiselessly as a cat,
towards something on the ground. His eyes were riveted upon it, 20 or
30 feet in front of him. To the rest of the party it was invisible.
The only noise was the flick of a hand on a pony's neck, removing a
horsefly; and even that was stopped, and all was hushed. We seemed to
hold our breath, and, though the guide was moving as quick as man
could move without a noise, he seemed to be creeping slowly, slowly.
He lifted up his arms as he came near his object, and then dived
forward, so to speak, not losing his balance, but taking a great step
and stooping, and recovering himself with equal speed. Then we saw his
game. He had caught by the tail a long snake, 5 or 6 feet long, and
was whirling it in the air.
It was thrilling to see it writhing in vain resistance to the laws of
matter and the tendency called centrifugal. Its wriggling ended after
two or three thwacks of its head upon the ground; but, long after it
was as limp as a whipcord, he went on twirling it and thwacking it. He
reminded me of the Scottish motto, "I mak' siccar," or "I make sure."
The legend is that when Bruce had stabbed a traitor at Dumfries and
said to a henchman, "I think I have killed him," the henchman
answered, "Think? I mak' siccar," and went and finished the killing.
Our guide was as resolute as he to make sure; but after a while he
held the limp thing at arm's length, and let it dangle a second or two
in front of him, undeniably dead. Then he flung it over his shoulder
and walked on in silence.
"Any use?" I cried.
"Curry for us all," he answered, looking backwards over his shoulder
and seeming surprised at the question.
In 1887, a few months later, being on the Pegu Yoma Mountains between
Toungoo and Thayetmyo, still on the same kind of business, and leading
a crowd of hungry men, I remembered this, and shot a python more than
7 yards long and as thick as a man's thigh. We met each other
accidentally, he and I. He had been dozing after dinner, and yawned in
the finest old Piccadilly style. I sent an unmannerly bullet into his
mouth, which killed him. For two days, at least, his flesh supplied
the wherewithal to flavour the rice of more than forty men; but I
cannot tell the taste of it. I have eaten silkworms curried. They
tasted like shrimps. But if the reader wishes to realise the savour of
snakes, let him eat them himself.