LEAVES FROM THE NOTE-BOOK OF. A NATURALIST. 



99 



of the skull brought to light modifications of the 

 lacertine structure leading towards the tortoises 

 and birds, which were before unknown. 



Before we sketch the natural history of the 

 crocodiles, it may not be unamusing to pass 

 rapidly in review some of the legends with which 

 the ancients connected a form selected by the 

 Egyptians as the symbol of a cruel and revengeful 

 being. The horrible shape and detestable dispo- 

 sition ef the crocodile made it an apt representa- 

 tive of the murderer of Osiris ;* and when it was 

 regarded as the personification of Typhon, it must 

 be confessed that it looked the character of that 

 evil one well, as any one will allow who looks on 

 the devilish woodcut that surmounts the old French 

 quatrain : 



Lc Nil produit des monstres perilleux, 

 Lors que d'Egypte arrouse le pais. 

 Mais centre ceux, dont sommes esbahiz, 

 Le crocodile est le plus merveilleux. 



The sculptor has done his best to make the 

 monster look decent as he appears on the robe of 

 the Nile in the celebrated statue ; but one of the 

 surrounding sixteen typical children finds himself 

 rather inconveniently near the open mouth of the 

 destroyer, and is represented as starting back ac- 

 cordingly ; while another lends him a hand to 

 help him out of the dangerous neighborhood. 

 Poor old Nilus ! he must have had warm work to 

 keep his crocodiles in anything like order when 

 the terror-stricken son of Clymene was hurried 

 by his father's runaway horses he knew not where, 

 and the quiet, steady Moon beheld with amaze- 

 ment her brother's chariot dashing along beneath 

 her own. The crocodilian commotion under that 

 smoking state of things must have been the cause 

 of his extremity of horror, for the Tanais, the 

 Ca'icus, the Lycormas, the Xanthus, the Maeander, 

 the Euphrates, the Ganges, the Danube, the Is- 

 menus, the Phasis, the Tagus, the Caister, whose 

 swans then sung their last and died ; the Rhine, 

 the Rhone, the Tiber all suffered equally, and 

 stood their ground ; but, 



Nilus in extremum ftfgit perterritus orbem 

 Occuluitque caput, quod adhuc latet. 



Father Thames was happily out of the way, or 

 not sufficiently known to the polite world on that 

 occasion. His turn, however, is at hand. A 

 foreign prince and priest, shot from his proper 

 sphere, is coming down upon him ; but we will 

 venture to prophesy that he will not run away 

 like the affrighted Nile, but continue to go be- 

 tween his banks and look the Archbishop of West- 

 minster boldly in the face. 



As the serpents had their Psylli, so the croco- 

 diles had their Tentyrita : 



Moreover, there is a kind of people that cary a 

 deadly hatred to the crocodile, and they be called 

 Tentyrites, of a certain isle even within Nilus, 



* Osiris, the popular divinity, the ruler of the Nile, the 

 benign dispenser of plenty, had, for his antagonist and 

 destroyer, Typhon, the scorching desert wind, that dried 

 up the fructifying waters, bearing famine and death on 

 its wings, when it unseasonably prevailed. 



which they inhabite. The men are but small of 

 stature, but in this quarrell against the crocodiles 

 they have hearts of lions, and it is wondrous to see 

 how resolute and courageous they are in this be- 

 halfe. Indeed this crocodile is a terrible beast to 

 them that flie from him ; but, contrary, let men 

 pursue him or make head againe, he runnes away 

 most cowardly. Now, these islanders be the only 

 men that dare encountre him in front. Over and 

 besides, they will take the river, and swim after 

 them ; nay, they will mount upon their backs, and 

 set them like horsemen ; and as they turn their 

 heads, with their mouths wide open to bite or 

 devour them, they will thrust a club or great cud- 

 gell into it crosse overthwart, and so holding hard 

 with both hands each end thereof, the one with the 

 right, and the other with the left, and ruling them 

 perforce (as it were) with a bit and bridle, bring 

 them to land, like prisoners ; when they have them 

 there, they will so fright them only with their 

 words and speech, that they compel them to cast 

 up and vomit those bodies againe to be enterred, 

 which they had swallowed but newly before. And 

 therefore it is, that this is the only isle which the 

 crocodiles will not swim to ; for the very smell and 

 sent of these Tentyrites is able to drive them away, 

 like as the Pselli, with their savor, put serpents to 

 flight. By report this beast seeth but badly in the 

 water ; but be they once without, they are most 

 quick-sighted. All the four winter months they 

 live in a cave and eat nothing at all. Some are of 

 opinion that this creature alone groweth all his life ; 

 and surely a great time he liveth.* 



To say nothing of more ordinary methods of 

 capture, if a crocodile was only touched with the 

 feather of an ibis it instantly became motionless ; 

 and there was another mode, if old chroniclers are 

 to be believed, not unworthy of note. It was 

 thought a bitter and bright, as well as a novel 

 idea, when some ill-conditioned scapegrace sent a 

 looking-glass to an importunate Gorgon, who was 

 qualified for admission into the Ugly Club if any 

 woman ever was, which we, with all gallantry 

 and humility, doubt in the hope that the first 

 look at herself would be fatal. But here again 

 we have the old adage, Pereant qui ante nos, &c. 

 " There is nothing new," &c., forced upon us. 

 The sure way to settle a crocodile, according to 

 ancient practice, was to confront him with a mir- 

 ror, when he incontinently died of fright at his 

 own deformity. 



" Crocodile tears" have become a proverb 

 somewhat musty ; and yet everybody may not 

 know that there was another version besides the 

 vulgar one, of working upon the kind-hearted 

 traveller by apparent distress, getting him within 

 reach, and then destroying him. It was held for 

 certain that when a crocodile had got hold of a 

 man and killed him, it consumed its prey com- 

 fortably enough till it came to the head, which 

 would have proved too hard a nut for our crocodile 1 

 to crack, without pouring forth a copious shower 

 of tears as a solvent, which softened the skull, 

 and put the ravenous reptile in easy possession of 

 its tit-bit the brain. 



One of their horrible functions, among the In- 



* Pliny. 



