346 Miscellaneous. CHAP. xxv. 



tucks himself in, in the middle. And so the tucking-in process goes on 

 as one outsider after another cools down, and wants a warm place in 

 the middle of the row, till it is too provoking to look at any longer. 

 Fancy fellows with long claws running over your head all night long at 

 intervals of a quarter of an hour, and your being blandly asked the 

 next morning if you " had passed a pleasant night ! " It would be too 

 exasperating. But that is just what these avadavats do every night of 

 their lives. And that is just what several of my ideas want to do, they 

 keep on wanting to tuck themselves in, in the wrong places. But I 

 cannot stand that, so these avadavatish ideas are allotted a perch to 

 themselves, whereon to jostle, and wriggle, and tuck themselves in 

 higgledy-piggledy, just as they like. Between ourselves, I verily 

 believe that, even after they have been arranged for the night by the 

 printer, they will fidget about and change their places. I therefore 

 disclaim all responsibility for their order. 



Crocodiles are very shy, and not to be caught, except by night line. 

 A simple way of setting this is to get a bamboo of full thickness, and 

 10 or 12 feet in length. To one end of it tie a hook with only a foot 

 of line between hook and bamboo. I used three large sea hooks tied 

 together like a treble hook. The line should not be a single cord, 

 which the crocodile can bite in two, but fifteen or twenty pieces of 

 common twine tied together at the ends, but not twisted at all. These 

 will get between his teeth, and escape being bitten, and their united 

 strength will hold him fast enough. Bait the hook, which must be a 

 large and very strong one, with a bull frog, or a fowl's entrails, or a 

 couple of crows, or any meat, and push the whole out into the lake, 

 pool, or fort moat in which the crocodiles are, and leave it for the 

 night. If there is a slight current, it is easy enough to attach a stone, 

 by way of anchor, by a long string to the other end of the bamboo, and 

 to drop it in. The line between the bamboo and the hook being so 

 short, the bait is kept near the surface, and is not liable to be concealed 

 amongst weeds, etc., at the bottom ; when the crocodile takes the bait 

 and turns down with it, the shortness of the line, and the ready 

 opposition of the floating bamboo, quickly strikes the hook into him, 

 and the more he tries to get down the more stoutly the bamboo resists 

 him, for it is full of air from end to end, and is a very powerful buoy. 

 As long as he keeps to the water the bamboo plays him well, and if he 

 tries the land he will soon be brought up with a round turn by the 



