βOnce when I was six years old I saw a magnificent picture in a book, called True Stories from Nature, about the primeval forest. It was a picture of a boa constrictor in the act of swallowing an animal. Here is a copy of the drawing.
In the book it said: βBoa constrictors swallow their prey whole, without chewin it. After that they are not able to move, and they sleep through the six months that they need for digestion.β
~First Lines of The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery