THE PADUCAH SUN — MARCH 04, 1903
FOUND NEW MONSTER ♢ (Veteran Missionary Tells of Hideous Reptile)
From Its Lair in a Mine, the Creature Attacks Workman—
Was Unlike Anything the Minister Had Ever Seen or Heard of.
Dr. Watkins, the veteran missionary who has just returned from a four months’ evangelical trip through the outlying states, tells a strange story of a wonderful snake which he killed in an old, abandoned shaft of a mine down in the State of Guerrero.
“My attention was attracted one day,” says Mr Watkins, “by the horrified cries of an Indian miner who came running toward me, his face ghastly with fright and the perspiration dripping like rain drops from his brow. The man rushed up and cast himself at my feet where he lay trembling and gasping. As soon as he was able to get his breath he told me that he had been seized by a horrible monster which had suddenly sprung upon him from one of the hidden recesses of the mine, and that he had narrowly escaped being drawn down into its embrace.
“My curiosity was aroused and proceeded to the mouth of the shaft with the man as soon as I could induce him to return. We looked down, but in the dense obscurity could see nothing. Drawing my revolver I bade the man go down into the shaft a way, assuring him that no harm would befall him, as I would follow close with my cocked revolver ready for use.
