310 LEAVES FROM THE 



in tlieir country. But as the crocodile, in a state of na- 

 ture, was not very likely to find any careful attendant 

 ready to rub his teeth with a napkin, Nature, it seems, 

 has sent him an animated feathered toothpick. 



The following, says the Halicarnassian, is the nature 

 of the crocodile : — During the four coldest months it 

 does not eat : though it has four feet, it is amphibious. 

 It lays its eggs on land, and hatches them there. The 

 greater part of the day is spent on the dry ground, but 

 the whole night in the river, for in the night-time the 

 water is warmer than the air and the dew, Of all living 

 things of which we know, this grows to be the longest 

 from the smallest beginning. It lays eggs little larger 

 than those of a goose, and tlie young at first is suitable 

 in size to the egg ; but when grown, it reaches to the 

 length of seventeen cubits and more. It has the eyes 

 of a pig, and the teeth and projecting tusks are large in 

 proportion to the body. It is the only animal that has 

 no tongue : it does not move the lower jaw, but is the 

 only animal that brings doAvn its upper jaw to the under 

 one. It is furnished with strong claws, and a skin co- 

 vered with scales not to be broken on the back.* 



With the exception of the very pardonable mistake 

 generally current with the ancients, in consequence of 

 their being deceived by appearances, about the absence 

 of the tongue and the want of motion in the lower jaw, 

 the description above given may pass very creditably ; 

 but then comes a statement, for which we have heard 

 Herodotus branded as a most daring fabulist. 



It is blind in the water, continues the historian, but 



crocodile. Emsah, or liamsa, is stated by the safest authorities to 

 be the Coptic word from which, with the feminine article prefixed, 

 has come the Arabic word timsah, now current on the banks of 

 the Nile. Herodotus, who was evidently aware of this name, gives 

 it under the form of X'^l^'^^ (champsa). 



* Ettt. 68. 



