Download and read  "In the Tiger Jungle And Other Stories of Missionary Work Among the Telugus of in" by Jacob Chamberlain

...lying on my back on my cot, reading my Greek Testament, which had been my daily com- panion from a boy. I was holding it up over me, reading a little, and shutting my eyes and think- ing a Uttle. This continued for near half an hour. At length the passage I was reading was finished, and I let the arm that was holding the book fall. 58 IN THE TIGER JUNGLE Then, and not until then, did I become aware that a huge serpent was coiled around one of the bamboo rafters, with some four feet of his body- hanging down directly over my head, with his eyes flashing and his tongue darting out, just above where my book had been and had concealed him. He had evidently been asleep in the roof; the putting in of my cot had awakened him. While I was reading he had let down one third of his body or more, and was looking to see what this leprous-looking white man was about, for he had probably never seen a white man before. His darting tongue was almost within arm's- length of my face when I caught sight...