OF RECENT CROCODILIANS. 155 
Cuvier, in his Essay on the species of existing Crocodiles, first published in the 10th 
volume of the ‘ Annales du Muséum,’ and reprinted in his ‘ Ossemens Fossiles’ under 
the head of Le Caiman & paupiéres osseuses (Crocodilus palpebrosus, nob.), after dividing 
this species into two varieties, expressed a doubt if they were not inhabitants of 
different continents. He observes, “One of my individuals, which has been for many 
years in the Museum, has on it the half-effaced name of Krokodile noir dw Niger in the 
hand-writing of Adanson,’—and proceeds thus :— 
“This naturalist, in his ‘ Voyage,’ speaks of two Crocodiles in the Senegal. M. de 
Beauvois adds that he saw at Guinea a Crocodile and a Caiman. It is therefore clear 
that there is a species with the form of a Caiman that inhabits Africa. 
“There remains still an embarrassment. Adanson says his Black Crocodile has the 
muzzle longer than the Green, which is certainly the same as the Crocodile of the Nile ; 
but we have a specimen ticketed by his own hand which has a much shorter muzzle 
than that from Egypt. 
' “Has Adanson made a mistake in writing this phrase? or has he erroneously 
ticketed the specimen? How are we to disentangle these errors?” &c., vol. v. p. 41. 
Duméril and Bibron, in their ‘ Erpétologie Générale’ (vol. iii. p. 75) adopt and 
repeat all that Cuvier has said, and still doubt if these two varieties may not be found, 
the one in America, and the other in Africa, 
If Cuvier and his successors had examined the two specimens on which they founded 
the account of his second variety of C. palpebrosus, they would have found that they were 
not only distinct species, but also species belonging to two genera or subgenera. The 
one which had served as the model for Seba, and which Seba, with the usual inat- 
tention to true habitats at that period, said came from Ceylon, was a true Alli- 
gator, and a native of America; and the other, ticketed by Adanson as from the 
Niger, was really a Crocodile from Africa : so that the sarcastic observation which he made 
on travellers, and which may in some cases be true, in this instance was uncalled for, 
the traveller being in fact more accurate than the cabinet naturalist ; and Adanson only 
made a slip of the pen in saying the beak was longer instead of shorter than the common 
Green Crocodile; and any one who compares the Black Crocodile of Africa with an 
American Caiman will not think that M. Beauvois was very much out when he called 
it a “ Caiman.” 
Cuvier, in his Essay, when describing Crocodilus biscutatus, established on the Gavial 
du Sénégal of Adanson, again refers to the Crocodile noir of that author. He states 
that among the drawings of Adanson there is the figure of a Crocodilus vulgaris, named 
Crocodile noir, and a Caiman & pawpiéres osseuses, inscribed the Crocodile vert. This 
must evidently have been an inadvertence, like the statement of the length of the nose ; 
but, as Cuvier observed, this is pardonable, as Adanson most probably named these draw- 
ings after he had forgotten them, and had been studying other things, long after his 
voyage, which occupied some of the first years of his youth. (See Cuvier, Oss. Foss. iii. 53.) 
