REMINISCENCES OF ALLIGATOR HUNTING. 327 



ing close upon the Reptilian came the Mammalian 

 age, and I hold that with the largest of the mammals 

 came man, rude in tastes and uncouth in form, but 

 even then ruling as king of the animal creation. 

 Wielded by a strength equal to that of a gorilla, his 

 club would dash in the skull of any beast which dare 

 dispute dominion with him." 



The text thus suggested him, the Professor then 

 diverged into an argument on his pet theory of man's 

 early existence. 



A trivial circumstance connected with our dis- 

 covery arrested my attention, and, from a sports- 

 man's stand-point, suggested a little theory of my 

 own. The head of the saurian rested on the basin's 

 edge, its jaws touching, with their stony tips, the 

 prairie, while down into the valley below stretched 

 the body and tail. This little fact dove-tailed itself 

 into some incidents of the past, and gave rise to quite 

 a train of speculation. 



Some years ago I hunted alligators in Mississippi. 

 Sitting on the bank of a sluggish bayou, I would 

 watch the surface of the water, close under which were 

 visible the noses of countless buffalo fish, floating as 

 one sees minnows do in glass jars. Under the hot 

 sun all nature seemed asleep. Soon, however, a black 

 knot, an ugly dark wart, not larger than one's twc 

 fists, would make its appearance, floating, like some 

 charred fragment, slowly along. 



To a stranger, the only suspicious circumstance 



would have been, that where there was no current 



whatever, it still continued its motion, the same as 



before. The experienced eye recognized this object 



18 



