CHAPTER IV 
West Coast of Africa (continued)—Crocodiles—Manatee—May- 
flies—Natives—Ju-ju—Hausa troops—Trip after Elephants. 
So man, striving boldly but blindly, 
Ground piecemeal in Destiny’s mill, 
At his best taking punishment kindly, 
Is only a chopping-block still. 
Apam Liypsay Gorpon. 
HE Calabar River swarms with croco- 
diles, some of them huge brutes, who 
account for a large number of natives 
in the course of a year. The water is always 
more or less discoloured, and very deep at 
a short distance from shore. Crocodiles that 
prey on human beings and on land animals have 
a habit of lying in wait to seize their prey at 
drinking-places and where the natives are in the 
habit of washing clothes. 
The sufferings of a victim after the first wild 
fright must be soon over, for they are drowned 
in the course of a minute or two. 
I have always loathed these brutes, and when 
crossing rivers invariably had a dread of being 
seized by one of them. It is not a comfortable 
feeling when fording a stream, say, two hundred 
yards wide, the water being nearly up to one’s 
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