CROCODILE ISLAND. 61 



when she fell down in a state of insensibility, from the violence of 

 her contending feelings. No sooner was her frail bark deserted, 

 than it became the object of a fearful battle to the monsters of the 

 deep. A crocodile of prodigious size rushed towards the canoe 

 from the reeds and high grass at the bank. His enormous body 

 swelled ; his plaited tail, brandished high, floated upon the la- 

 goon. The waters, like a cataract, descended from his open jaws. 

 Clouds of smoke issued from his nostrils. The earth trembled 

 with his thunder. But immediately, from the opposite side, a 

 rival champion emerged from the deep. They suddenly darted 

 upon each other. The boiling surface of the lake marked their 

 rapid course, and a terrific conflict commenced. Sometimes they 

 sank to the bottom folded together in horrid wreaths. The water 

 became thick and discoloured. Again they rose to the surface, 

 and their jaws clapt together with a noise that echoed through 

 the surrounding forest. Again they sank, and the contest ended 

 at the bottom of the lake; the vanquished monster making his 

 escape to the sedges at the shore. The conqueror now directed 

 his co\irse to the canoe. He raised his head and shoulders out 

 of the water and putting his little short paws into the boat, he 

 overturned it in an instant, and in a few moments, fragments 

 of it were swimming about in all directions. 



" When Nemrooma saw the horrid scene, she clung convulsively 

 to my arm, and in some degree impeded my efforts to eflect our 

 escape, I cautioned her to be still, and pushed with all my 

 force towards the entrance of the river, out of the lagoon. But, 

 alas! fortune was here against us. It was the time at which 

 myriads upon myriads of fish take their course up the river ; and, 

 as the stream is shallowest at this place, the crocodiles had chosen 

 it as their position to intercept their prey. The wliole water, for 

 miles on each side, seemed alive with fish. The line of croco- 

 diles extended from shore to shore ; and it was the most horrific 

 sight I ever witnessed, to see them dash into the broken ranks 

 of the fish and grind in their prodigious jaws a multitude of the 

 largest trouts, whose tails flapped about their mouths and eyes, 

 ere they had swallowed them. The horrid noise of their closing 

 jaws — their rising with their prey some feet upright above the 

 water — the floods of foam and blood rushing out of their mouths 

 and the clouds of vapour issuing from their distended nostrils, 

 were truly horrifying. Anxious to escape, I now began to paddle 

 towards the shore of the lagoon, in order to land and wait till tlie 

 army of fish had forced tlieir passage, after which, I concluded. 



