The pamphlet, True and Wonderfull, was published in London in August 1614 by John Trundle. It claims a strange and monstrous serpent had been discovered in St Leonard's Forest, two miles from Horsham and thirty miles from London, to the great annoyance and several slaughters of men and cattle by its strong and violent poison.
The creature is described as nine feet or more in length, shaped like the axle of a cart, thick in the middle, with a neck an ell long ringed by white scales, a blackish back and a red underside. It is said to leave a slimy trail and keep to a rabbit warren of three to four square miles, in an area that includes Faygate. The pamphlet names three witnesses, John Steele, Christopher Holder and a widow woman.
Edward Lucas, in Highways and Byways in Sussex, notes the story can be read in the Harleian Miscellany and wonders what the witnesses really saw. Later writers have called it a wonder pamphlet, suggested an adder, and in one modern essay a great crested newt. It is best read as a printed tale of 1614 with names attached, not as a verified event. The forest is large, so the pin is a central estimate.
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