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Show dropped. A lump of raw meat being I thrown it, in the short time of rive iniu-utes iniu-utes the blood will bo thoroughly drunk up and the mass thrown aside. Its voracity vo-racity is almost beyond belief, it devour-, devour-, ing tit one time over ten pounds of meat, though it may be deprived of all food for weeks without any apparent loss cf vitality. vi-tality. Mr. Dunstaa attempted to bring away a root of the eagenas, but it died du.ing his return voyage, growing eo foul with a strong odor of real animal corruption that he was obliged to get rid of it. New Orleans Cor. Atlanta Constitution, " " ' "WW r A DANGEROTJ3 PWNT. ' ., It Sacks the Blood of Whatever Comes ta Contact with It. Leroy Dunstan, the well known naturalist natu-ralist of this city, who has recently returned re-turned from Central America, where he had spent nearly two years in the study of the flora and fauna of the country, relates the finding of a singular growth in one of the rwunps about 'JL great lakes of Nicaragua. He was engaged in hunting for botanical botan-ical and entomological specimens in this swamp, which is known as 8aa Sebastian's, Sebas-tian's, when he hesjfid his dog cry out aa if in agony from wSJscance. Running to the spot from which the animal's cries came, Mr. Dunstan found him enveloped in a perfect network of what seemed to be a fine, ropelike tissue of roots or fibers, the nature of which wm unknown to him. The plant or vine seemed composed entirely en-tirely of bare, interlacing stems, resembling resem-bling more than anything else the branches of the weeping willow denuded of all foliage, but of a dark, nearly black hue, and covered with a tl-os, viscit? gan 'hat exuded from the pores. D bowing- his knife, Mr. Dunstan endeavored to cut the animal free, but it was only with the greatest difficulty that he succeeded suc-ceeded in severing the fleshy, muscular fiber. To his horror and amazement the naturalist then saw that the dog's body iu covored with blood, while his hairless hair-less skin appeared to have been actually sucked or puckered in spots, and the animal ani-mal staggered m it horn weakness and exhaustion. - In cutting the Tine thu twigs curled like living, sinuous fingers about Mr. Dunstan 's hand, and it required no slight force to free the member from its clinging cling-ing grasp, which left the flesh red and blistered. The gum exuding from the vine wm of a grayish dark tinge, remarkably re-markably adhesive and of a disagreeable animal odor, very powerful and nauseating nauseat-ing to inhale. The native servants who accompanied Mr. Dunstan manifested the greatest horror of the vine, which they call la sagenas de diabie, the devil's seine or snare, and were full of atones of its death dealing powers. One af these stories was of an Englishman English-man residing in Managua, who, while hunting iu the swamp a few years ago, lay down beneath a tree where a large and powerful specimen of this singular plant was growing, and, inadvertently falling asleep, awoke to find himself enveloped en-veloped in its web, and in spite of every effort made to extricate him, perished in its deadly embrace. Another story was of an escaped convict con-vict who had hidden in the swamp, whose bones had been found in the folds of the sagenas only a short time before Mr. Dunstan's visit. These stories, remarkable re-markable a they seem, are firmly believed be-lieved in by tho people, but tho only three specimeus which Mr. Dunstan was able to find were all small ones, though the meshes of the largest would probably, prob-ably, if extended in a straight line, measure nearly, if not quite, 100 feet. He was able to discover very little about the nature of the plant, owing to the difficulty dif-ficulty of handling it, for iu grasp can only be torn away with loss of Gkin and even of fle3h, but, so near an Mr. Dunstan could ascertain, its power of suction ia contained in a number of infinitesimal mouths or little suckers, which, ordinarily ordina-rily closed, open for the reception of food. The gum exuded seems to serve the two fold purpose of increasing its tenacity ten-acity and overcoming a victim by its sickening odor. The plant is found only in low, wet places, and usually beneath a large tree, and while dormant seems only a network of dry, dead vines covering cov-ering the black earth for several feet, but coming into contact with anything will instantly begin to twist and twine upward in a horrible, lus like manner, breaking out with the gum like substance spoken of before, and tnwrap the object with a celerity almost incredible. If tbe substance is animal the blood is drawn off and tbe carcass or refuse thaa |