EXISTING CROCODILES 2373 



bones, by the presence of a strongly-developed bony armor on the inferior surface 

 of the body, and by the bony plates on the upper surface being articulated 

 together. 



Caimans, or jacares, as they are called by the natives of Brazil, are restricted 

 to Central and South America, where they are' represented by five species. Of 

 these, the largest, and at the same time the best known, is the black or great 

 caiman ( Caiman niger) , from the rivers of tropical South America eastward of the 

 Andes, which takes its name from the black of the upper surface of the body, the 

 under parts being yellow. This species, which generally attains a length of about 

 fourteen feet, is characterized by its partially bony and flat upper eyelid, by the 

 presence of upper temporal fossae in the skull, by the number of teeth in each pre- 

 maxillary or anterior upper jawbone being five, and the number of lower teeth be- 

 ing seventeen or eighteen. Nearly allied, although of much smaller size, are the 

 broad-nosed caiman (C. latirostris} , ranging from the Amazon to the Rio de la 

 Plata, and the spectacled caiman (C sclerops), from Central and South America, 

 both of which have the upper eyelid rugose, with a small horn-like projection, 

 while in the skull the socket of the eye does not extend so far forward. Both are 

 uniformly blackish when adult; but in the former the skull is very wide, and the 

 number of lower teeth from seventeen to eighteen, while in the latter the skull is 

 narrower, and the lower teeth vary from eighteen to twenty. The two remaining 

 species (C. trigonatus and C. palpebrosus) are still smaller, and characterized by the 

 color of the upper parts being yellowish brown, spotted and barred with black; 

 while the upper eyelid is completely bony, the skull has no upper temporal fossa, 

 there are but four teeth in each premaxillary bone, and the number of lower teeth 

 is from twenty to twenty-two on each side. 



On the Amazon and Orinoco, as well as other South- American rivers, caimans 

 are to be met with in myriads, and appear to be very similar in their habits to the 

 crocodiles of the Old World. Writing of the great caiman jacare-uassu of the 

 natives Bates says that "it grows to a length of eighteen or twenty feet, and 

 attains an enormous bulk. L,ike the turtles, the alligator [as he calls it] has its 

 annual migrations, for it retreats to the interior pools and flooded forests in the dry 

 season. During the months of high water, therefore, scarcely a single individual is 

 to be seen in the main river. In the middle part of the Lower Amazon, about 

 Obydos and Villa Nova, where many of the lakes with their channels of communi- 

 cation with the trunk stream dry up in the fine months, the alligator buries itself 

 in the mud and becomes dormant, sleeping till the rainy season returns. On the 

 Upper Amazon, where the dry season is never excessive, it has not this habit. It 

 is scarcely exaggerating to say that the waters of the Solimoens are as well stocked 

 with large alligators as a ditch in England is in summer with tadpoles." By 

 the natives of these regions the caiman is at once despised and feared; the same 

 traveler relating how on one occasion he saw a party boldly enter the water and 

 pull to shore one of these large reptiles by its tail; while at another time two 

 medium-sized specimens that had been captured in a net were coolly returned to the 

 water hard by where a couple of children were playing. Sometimes, however, they 

 have to pay dearly for such temerity. The Indians of Guiana, according to Water- 



