Why lies this mighty serpent here,

Let him who knoweth tell —

With its head to the land and its huge tail near

The shore of fair Loch Nell?

Why lies it here? — not here alone,

But far to East and West

The wonder-working snake is known,

A mighty god confessed.

Where Ganga scoops his sacred bed,

And rolls his blissful flood,

Above Trimurti’s threefold head

The serpent swells his hood.

And where the procreant might of Nile

Impregned the seedful rood,

Enshrined with cat and crocodile

The holy serpent stood.

And when o’er Tiber’s yellow foam

The hot sirocca blew,

And smote the languid sons of Rome

With fever’s yellow hue,

Then forth from Esculapius’s shrine

The Pontiff’s arm revealed,

In folded coils, the snake divine,

And all the sick were healed.

And Wisest Greece the virtue knew

Of the bright and scaly twine,

When winged snakes the chariot drew

From Dame Demeter’s shrine.

And Maenad maids, with festive sound,

Did keep the night awake,

When with three feet they beat the ground,

And hymned the Bacchic snake.

And west, far west, beyond the seas,

Beyond Tezcuco’s lake,

In lands where gold grows thick as peas,

Was known this holy snake.

And here the mighty god was known

In Europe’s early morn,

In view of Cruachan’s triple cone,

Before John Bull was born.

And worship knew of Celtic ground,

With trumpets, drums, and bugles,

Before a trace in Lorn was found

Of Campbells or Macdougalls.

And here the serpent lies in pride

His hoary tale to tell,

And rears his mighty head beside

The shore of fair Loch Nell.

Poem written by Prof. Blackie, accompanying the description of the Loch Nell serpent by Miss Cummin, quoted in The Serpent Mound by E.O. Randall