ALLIGATOR. 



are not larger than those of a goose, and indeed ge- 

 nerally not so large. They are eatable, as also is 

 the flesh of the animals ; hut the flavour of both is 

 rather musky for European palates. As to the 

 number of eggs which the female drops, authors are 

 not agreed ; some say as many as a hundred, and 

 others little more than a fourth part of that number. 

 Both are, probably, in so far right ; for as the female 

 returns to the water every day, it is probable that 

 she deposits part only in one hole. During that 

 operation they are not voracious ; and perhaps they, 

 like the turtle, abstain in great part from eating at 

 that time. Their grand feasts are during the floods, 

 especially the first of them, whether from the southern 

 rains, or the melting of the snows at the sources of 

 more northerly rivers, such as the Mississippi. These 

 rains by their vio'ence beat down many animals, and 

 sweep away many anirnal remains, wafting them all 

 to those temporary lakes in the forests, in which the 

 water stagnates with its floatage. Recent or putrid 

 mammalia, birds, reptiles, or fish (for sonic of the lat- 

 ter are killed, and many lose their management), are all 

 the same to the alligators. Mountain cat, monkey, 

 vulture, parrot, snake, lizard, fish (the gymnotus 

 itself), or even the deadly bushmaster, all find jaws 

 ready to sefie them ; and while the harvest lasts, 

 which may be about eight or ten weeks in the average 

 of places, the reptiles wax fat, and are able to un- 

 dergo the labours of the year with little food, as has 

 been said. 



And there is not a doubt that these large and 

 powerful reptiles, whether alligators, as so called, 

 crocodiles, or gavials, perform an important part in 

 nature's economy by so doing. In spite of all that 

 they take, and they are neither few nor indolent at 

 that time (tor in them as in other creatures the time 

 of activity and of appetite is the same), there remains 

 enough to putrify and steam up with the returning 

 heat, so as to render the atmosphere abundantly 

 pestilent to all who have the hardihood to encounter 

 it. But it' they did not do their work, and if the 

 larger grail id a; and the vultures did not come aftoi 

 as soon as there is provision for them, the banks ol 

 the rivers could not bo approached within many 

 miles, unless by those who sought to die there. 



We mention those scenes and circumstances, not 

 for the sake of those whose taste in natural science 

 goes after " an alligator st nlled ;" but who would rather 

 know something of the haunts of the alligator, and o 

 what that ve.rv powerful and very pecidiar anima 

 does there. And it is for a similar reason, rathei 

 than for any urgent systematic necessity there is foi 

 it, that we have resolved to divide the family, or per- 

 haps, systematically speaking, the genus, into the 

 three popular sections of alligators, crocodiles, am 

 <rn vials. By this means we shall be able to remlei 

 each group an index to a certain portion of the work- 

 equally interesting and peculiar in all its characters. 

 The most remarkable distinguishing character o 

 each of these groups is the shape of the head. Tin 

 gavials have it the most produced, the crocodiles tfo 

 next, and the alligators have it shortest. In then 

 the length of the jaws from the articulation is onh 

 one half more than the greatest breadth. The teetl 

 have a ragged appearance, as some of them are long 

 and others short. There are never fewer than nine 

 teen in each side of either jaw, and Sometimes tw 

 more in each side of the under one. These grov 

 with the growth of the animal ; and receiving cavitie 



re formed for them in the upper jaw, especially from 

 liose fourth from the front, which are longer than 

 ny of the others. The body is low and squat ; the 

 hid legs are nearly round in their section, and have 

 o membrane on the sides ; the webs of the toes also 

 xtend only half the length ; and the holes behind 

 lie orbits, "which are understood to'secrete a musky 

 uid in the crocodiles, are small and obscure, or 

 wanting. 



From the structure of the feet, and the want of 

 ringed or pectinated membranes on the hind legs, 

 A'hich arc both a lessening of the pelagic structure, 

 illigators keep more to the fresh waters, the rivets 

 ind lagunes, than the crocodiles ; so that those in the 

 >ays of the West India islands, though popularly 

 novm as alligators or caymans, are rather to be con- 

 idercd as crocodiles, even in the popular sense of 

 hat term. 



The following figure will afford a better general 

 notion of the shape of the animal than could be given 

 n even a lengthened description. 





There are four species or more, all natives of t he- 

 warmer parts of the American continent ; but vary- 

 ing in their appearance, so as in some of the species 

 to resemble the crocodiles, and in others the gavials. 



The species which, in the written accounts at least, 

 is the most ferocious and formidable to man is that 

 which inhabits the Mississippi and the other rivers 

 of the southern parts of North America, and the 

 swamps and lagunes which these rivers form when 

 they are swollen by floods. It. is the pike-headed 

 aligator (Al/i(il<- /'ncii/x) of Cuvier, so called because 

 its head, in shape at least, bears some resemblance to 

 that of the common pike. This species has been 

 seen as long as fifteen feet ; with the head two feet 

 long, and the gape nearly the same. The jaws are 

 more elongated than in some other species, the 

 breadth at the articulation not being in those of the 

 size mentioned much more than one foot. The snout 

 is flattened on the upper surface, and slightly turned 

 up at the extremity, which is bluntly pointed'; but the 

 sides of the jaws are, for the greater portion of the 

 length of the gape, nearly parallel. The teeth are 

 large and irregular, with the fourth from the front in 

 each side of the under jaw much larger than the rest, 

 so that they can penetrate through a substance of 

 considerable thickness, and, with their points received 

 into the sockets in the upper jaw, hold on against a 

 very considerable strain. It is by this means that the 

 animal is said to master the larger mammalia, when 

 they come to the shores to quench their thirst. The 

 alligator, having observed its prey, swims slowly to- 

 ward it, with the snout barely above the water. When 

 within reach it seizes the upper lip and nose ; and at 



