[Highways & Byways in Sussex by E.V. Lucas]@TWC D-Link bookHighways & Byways in Sussex CHAPTER XIII 6/10
There are several at Wadhurst, for example. [Sidenote: THE "LAND SERPENT"] I have seen grass snakes in plenty in St.Leonard's Forest, and was once there with a botanist who, the day being fine, killed a particularly beautiful one; but the Forest is no longer famous, as once it was, for really alarming reptiles.
The year 1614 was the time.
A rambler in the neighbourhood, in August of that year, ran the risk of meeting something worth running away from; just as John Steel, Christopher Holder, and a widow woman did.
Their story may be read in the Harleian Miscellany. _True and Wonderful_ is the title of the narrative, _A Discourse relating a strange and monstrous Serpent (or Dragon) lately discovered, and yet living, to the great Annoyance and divers Slaughters both of Men and Cattell, by his strong and violent Poyson: In Sussex, two Miles from Horsam, in a Woode called St.Leonard's Forrest, and thirtie Miles from London, this present Month of August, 1614.
With the true Generation of Serpents._ The discourse runs thus:--"In Sussex, there is a pretty market-towne, called Horsam, neare unto it a forrest, called St.Leonard's Forrest, and there, in a vast and unfrequented place, heathie, vaultie, full of unwholesome shades, and over-growne hollowes, where this serpent is thought to be bred; but, wheresoever bred, certaine and too true it is, that there it yet lives.
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