298 UNDER THE AFRICAN SUN 



the croc flesh there was a leper with some of his fingers gone. 

 I heard that some natives believe, that eating the reptile cures 

 leprosy, whilst they also believe this fell disease is caused by 

 eating however tiny a bit of crocodile flesh. 



These diametrically opposite views have their European 

 representatives in so-called homoepathic treatment of disease, 

 and in the queer notion of curing rabies by applying " a hair 

 of the dog that bit you." 



In the stomach of the croc we found, besides the usual 

 quantity of stones, a huge fish ; but it was too decomposed 

 even for native insensibility to eat. The fore-paws of the croc 

 have five toes and resemble hands ; they are small, and only 

 the three inner toes have nails. The hind-paws are huge, but 

 have only four toes, three of which have nails. From tip of 

 snout to tip of tail this croc measured 13 feet 11 inches. 



These reptiles have not the narrow-pointed jaws of the 

 Indian "gavial," and they dift'er from New World alligators in 

 the teeth of the lower jaw fitting into notches in the upper 

 jaw, and not into specially provided sockets. 



On a subsequent visit I secured a second specimen of croc. 

 This one I also shot with a ISIartini bullet. It was much 

 smaller, it measured only 12 feet ih inches. I removed the 

 teeth, and kept over fifty of them, not counting small ones. 

 The large teeth are curios worth keeping. In both crocs I 

 cut off the flap of skin over the abdomen ; this is the softest 

 part of the skin, and when tanned it constitutes the valuable 

 crocodile leather of commerce. 



As soon as the Uganda railway is completed, and the Cairo- 

 to-Cape line realised, some enterprising individual may succeed 

 in establishing a brisk and lucrative trade with Europe in croco- 

 dile skins from Fajao and the upper reaches of the Nile. 



