152 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XL 



have the head at least twice as long as it is broad ; whilst the alligator's head' 

 is in length compared with width as three to two. 



There are about twelve or thirteen species of crocodiles, as distinct from 

 alligators, recognised, namely :— 



1. The garial, gavial, or nakoo, G. gangeticus, Giinther, Ghanalis gange- 

 ticus, Theobald Catalogue ; Indus, Ganges, Brahmapootra, Mahanadi in 

 Orissa, Kaladyne river, Arrakan ? 



2. Journey's false gavial, Tomistoma schlegelii, Gray ; Borneo. 



3. Crocodilus cataphr actus, Cuvier, snout gavial-like ; West Africa. 



4. C.johnstonii, snout gavial-like ; North Australia. 



5. C. intermedins ; Orinoko. 



6. C. americanus ; Central America, West Indies, Florida. 



7. C. siamensis ; Siam, Java. 



8. C. niloticus ; the Nile, and Madagascar. 



9. C.porosus ; India, Ceylon, and North-East Australia. 



10. C. palusiris ; India and Ceylon. 



11. C. robuslus ; Madagascar. 



12. C. rhonibifer ; Cuba. 



13. C. moroletti ; Honduras. 



The name crocodile was in the first instance applied by the Greeks to those 

 they saw in Africa — xpoxodeiXos being the name of a lizard they were familiar 

 with in their own country, just as el lagarto (the lizard), corrupted into 

 alligator, was applied by the Spaniards to the cayman of South America. The 

 generic name in Egypt was champsa ; and it is still called timpsa (another 

 form of the word) in that country. 



The tongue of the crocodile is entirely attached to the floor of the mouth, 

 and cannot therefore be protruded. The ancients consequently concluded 

 that it had no tongue ; and it is supposed that because of this peculiarity it 

 was chosen as a fitting emblem of the Deity, who orders all things by his will 

 alone. Some time ago I came across a copy of " Sandys' Travels," 1670, from 

 which the following extract will prove interesting : — 



The country people do often take them in pitfalls, and grapling their chops together with 

 an iron, bring them alive to Cairo. They take them also with hooks baited with sheeps or 

 goats, and tied with a rope to the trunk of a tree. The flesh of them they eat, all saving 

 the head and tail, aod sell their skins unto merchants who convey them into Christendome 

 for the rarity. It is written in the Arabian records how Humeth Aben Thaulon (being 

 Governor of Egypt for Gifar Matanachi, Caliph of Babylon), in the 270th year of their flegir, 

 caused the leaden image of a crocodile, found amongst the ruines of an ancient temple, to. 

 be molten ; since when the inhabitants have complained, and that those serpents have been 

 more noysome unto them than before, affirming that it was made and there buried by the 

 ancient magicians to restrain their endamagings. 



