A TAME CROCODILE. 399 



mouth of this reptile is completely formed for 

 snatch and swallow.' My experience and observation 

 accord with Swainson's statement. I had so set 

 down the habit of this reptile, on the authority of 

 the Spaniards of Hispaniola, in the notes I made 

 when in that part of Haiti ; but when I returned to 

 Cape Haitien, I had an opportunity of proving it. 

 The French consul, M. Barbot, had an Alligator, 

 which he kept in a cistern, fed by a mountain spring, 

 in a pretty garden of his residence. The Alligator 

 would be found in the water all day, but at night he 

 rambled over the garden, which was walled in ; and 

 was then a diligent catcher of frogs and toads. 

 Usually in the morning, some half dozen hatrachians 

 would be found mangled and torn, and stuffed into 

 all the crannies and corners of the cistern convenient 

 for that purpose ; their long disentangled entrails 

 streaming out into the water. The Alligator would 

 rise to the surface, take portions of the limbs and en- 

 trails into its mouth, and holding them with its teeth 

 pressed close, with part of the entrails on one and 

 the other side of its mouth, would gently squeeze 

 the whole of the food, and swallow it most leisurely. 

 Its action in eating most resembled a person chew- 

 ing a ' quid' of tobacco. In this way it always fed, 

 at least hy day. This just agrees with the common 

 account. The British consul, Mr. Heneiken, of Puerta 

 Plata, an excellent observer in natural history, told 

 me that in numerous Alligators he had killed and 

 opened, he found nothing solid within them, ex- 

 cept sticks and stones. The swallowing of these 

 substances is an instinct they have in common with 



