210 AUSTKALIAN CROCODILES 



several writers on the Nile, who claimed to be eye-witnesses of 

 this comedy, one does not care to vouch for the truth of the 

 story. North Queensland farmers attribute to the " Alliyators," 

 as they are there universally but erroneously called, the loss of 

 many a calf or sheep, and even horses are occasionally to be 

 seen the scars on whose quarters attest the terrible struggles 

 which must have taken place between them and these reptiles. 

 Wallabies and other indigenous mammals, while drinking or 

 swimming a creek, frequently fall a prey to them, and birds also 

 contribute in some degree to their bill of fare, for Mr. Charles 

 Hedley, to whom I am indebted for much interesting infor- 

 mation respecting their habits, tells me that he has frequently 

 seen little heaps of the feathers of the "Blue Crane" (Ardea 

 7iov(Bhullandice) in their camps ; these feathers are probably 

 stripped off the victim by means of the reptiles' paws, in the 

 use of which they are very expert ; dacks and other waterfowl 

 also fall victims to their canning, while birds which when shot 

 happen to fall in the water are often snapped up immediately 

 by crocodiles. 



It is quite possible, though contrary to generally accepted 

 opinion, that these reptiles, like the larger Carnivora, only 

 acquire a taste for human flesh in exceptional cases, and this 

 habit may be broui^ht into existance in various ways, the most 

 common of which is some disability such as increasing age, or 

 an injury, which prevents the individual competing on equal 

 terms with his fellows, and it therefore falls back upon such 

 prey as in its natural state is least able to defend itself against 

 attack. The following incident seems to bear upon this theory : 

 A duck having been shot and fallen in the water, the spoi'tsiaan, 

 while swiuiming out to retrieve his game, was actually touched 

 by a crocodile of this species, which was also bent upon seizing, 

 and in fact did immediately afterwards seize and carry off the 

 struggling quarry, thus rejecting the man, though absolutely at 

 his mercy, in favour of the bird ; needless to say, however, the 

 swimmer lost no time in placing the "good dry land " beneath 

 his feet again. 



Their large nests are constructed in the dense mangrove 

 swamps which line the banks of our northern rivers, and are 

 composed of " grape-vines, reeds, grasses, and other rubbish of a 

 somewhat similar nature to those of the brush turkey " (Mr. T- 

 Wyndham, in litem) ; and in the same manner the eggs are 

 hatched out by means of the heat engendered through the fer- 



