NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 331 



The father, a strong and skilful swimmer, armed with a 

 short sword, leaped in after the reptile, dived under it, 

 and by a succession of vigorous stabs in the belly com- 

 pelled the monster to make for the bank, where it depo- 

 sited the child half-dead. Mr. Waterton is not the only 

 rider who has bestridden one of these river Bucephali. 

 He mounted an alligator. Adanson witnessed and 

 shared in an engagement with a true crocodile. The 

 negroes, it appears, in the neighbourhood of the river 

 Senegal, boldly attack these monsters ; and on one occa- 

 sion a negro discovered a crocodile seven feet long asleep, 

 among some bushes at the foot of a tree near the banks 

 of the river. The negTo stealthily crept up, and inflicted 

 a deep wound on the side of the reptile's neck. The 

 crocodile with one sweep of his tail knocked the negro 

 off his legs ; but he rose instantly, and slipped a rope 

 over the crocodile's muzzle, while one of his companions 

 secured the formidable tail. Then Adanson leaped on 

 the crocodile's back and kept it down, while the negro 

 drew out the knife, which he had left sticking in the 

 wound, and cut off his antagonist's head. Another 

 author mentions one of the garrison of Fort St. Louis 

 who used frequently to amuse himself with these duels, 

 and always with success : till at last he was so terribly 

 wounded in one of those combats, that he must have 

 been killed outright if some of his comrades had not 

 come to the rescue. 



Sir Hans Sloane was offered the stuffed skin of an 

 alligator nineteen feet long when he was at Jamaica, 

 but he could not accept of it on account of its size, 

 ' wanting room to stow it.' The story of its capture, as 

 related by him, is curious. The people in the neighbour- 

 hood of the bay between Port Royal and Passage Fort 

 having suffered great loss of cattle by its depredations, a 

 dog was used as a bait, with a piece of wood tied to a 

 cord, the farther end of which was made fast to a bed- 



