SOURCE: The Princess and Curdie (1882) by George MacDonald

DESCRIPTION: "...One of them, for instance, was like a boa constrictor walking on four little stumpy legs near its tail.  About the same distance from its head were two little wings, which it was forever fluttering as if trying to fly with them.  Curdie thought it fancied it did fly with them, when it was merely plodding on busily with its four little stumps.  How it managed to keep up he could not think, till once when he missed it from the group: the same moment he caught sight of something at a distance plunging at an awful serpentine rate through the trees, and presently, from behind a huge ash, this same creature fell again into the group, quietly waddling along on its four stumps." (The Princess and Curdie by George MacDonald)

NOTES: The Legserpent is one of the 49 Uglies found living in the dark forest on the way to the king's castle. Next to Lina, he is the most useful of Curdie's animals. It acts as a ladder in the cavern beneath Curdie's prison. It holds the Lord Chamberlain in his bed by coiling around him. The Legserpent is one of the guards of the conspirators and a dangerous fighter in the battle with the Borsagrassians.

HISTORY: Macdonald has a lot of affection for this weird creature, mentioning it more often than most of the 49 Uglies.