Forlong - Rivers of Life

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Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
These Kali-isms of India we would expect from persons adopting great Kali’s name or
that of soft IOnia’s god: see the spear-head, which is one of the oldest Phallic forms,
page 185, and figures in chapter on Kyklops and Kelts.
I give here a drawing of the celebrated Earthern serpent of Glen Feochan, shown
as just emerging from dark mossy Loch Nell, near Oban; it lies at the only spot,
Fig 133.—SERPENT MOUND, LOCH NELL.
where a perfect view can be had of the triple cone of Ben Kruachan. Miss Gordon
Cumming gives us an excellent description of the Serpent in Good Words for March
1872, which, with some notes of my own, will enable us to clearly understand this
strange monument. Professor Blackie apostrophizes the deity in the following lines:
Why lies this mighty serpent here, And when o’er Tiber’s yellow foam
Let him who knoweth tell— The hot sirocco blew,
With its head to the land and its huge tail near And smote the languid sons of Rome
The shore of the fair Loch Nell? With fever’s yellow hue,
Why lies it here?—not here alone, Then forth from Æsculapius’ shrine
But far to East and West The Pontiff’s arm revealed,
The wonder-working snake is known, In folded coils, the snake divine,
A mighty god confessed. And all the sick were healed.
Where Ganga scoops his sacred bed, And wisest Greece the virtue knew
And rolls his blissful flood, Of the bright and scaly twine,
Above Trimurti’s threefold head When wingèd snakes the chariot drew
The serpent swells his hood. From Dame Demeter’s shrine.
And where the procreant might of Nile, And Mænad maids, with festive sound,
Impregned the seedful rood, Did keep the night awake
Enshrined with cat and crocodile When with free feet they beat the ground,
The holy serpent stood. And hymned the Bacchic snake.