BOOK III. ^HAP. VHI. 573 



(loubtlefs not from any freedom of choice, but fuhjedl to the limi- 

 tation of the fame in(lin6t, which urges them to dcftroy the fuper- 

 fluous part of their progeny. 



Nothing, I venture to think, but their ill looks has faved thefc 

 animals from being a favourite article of food among the Negroes ; 

 but, if this prejudice fhould happen to wear off, their numbers in 

 Jamaica would be confiderably leilened in the caurfe of a few 

 years. When Columbus firfl: came to St. Domingo, he found that 

 their flefh was in high efleem with^tlig^Indians. I have no doubt 

 but the flefh of a middle- fized one ^ as relifliing as turtle, which it 

 exactly refembles in appearance, and in tafte alfo, as I have been 

 afilired by a gentleman of my acquaintance, who made the expe- 

 riment, and caufed fome to be drelied turtle-fafliion, which he ex- 

 tolled very highly, and found it fit equally well upon his ftomach, 

 though a man of rather delicate habit. But, in order to prepare 

 them for cookery, the mufk-bags muft be cut out before their bo- 

 dies are cold; otherwife thefe glands wall communicate their fla- 

 vour to every other part. An oflScer, who was ftationed at Penfa- 

 cola fince the war, declared to me, that his men very frequently ate 

 them, and found them relifliing and nutritive. They probably 

 took the hint from the Indians in that part of the continent, who 

 are faid to have been always fond of this food. It is plain, I think, 

 that writers have confounded the alligator with the crocodile; and 

 have reported more on the faith of ftories they heard from others, 

 than their own critical examination. Barbot, fpeaking of crocodiles, 

 fays their ufual food is fifli. Le Maire, that they will fometimes 

 eat fi(h only, and at other times venture upon nian ; likewife, that 

 fome are venomous, and others not; and that they feed on pif- 

 mires. Navarette affirms, that fcuUs, bones, and pebbles, have been 

 found in a crocodile's belly. Bofman, on the other hand, ailerts, 

 that the crocodile is an inoffenfive animal ; that he never heard, it 

 devoured either man or beaft ; though moft authors infift, that it 

 will attack both. Norden reports, that he faw feveral crocodiles 

 on the landy banks of the Nile, of different fizes, from fifteen to 

 fifty feet in length j that the greater part of them would not per- 

 mit themfelves to be approached, but darted into the water before 

 any man could get within gun-(hot of them; that the natives. 

 Vol. III. 5 T who 



