ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



1399 



the body. For a considerable fraction of time 

 he leaned forward. Then without effort, with- 

 out apparent leajo or jump he dived straight 

 downward, as beautifully as a seal, direct as a 

 plummet and very swiftly. There was a scarce- 

 ly-noticeable splash, and as I gazed with real 

 awe, I watched the widening ripples which un- 

 dulated over the muddy water — the only trace 

 of the whereabouts of the young bird. 



It seemed as if no one, whether ornithologist, 

 evolutionist, poet or philosopher could fail to 

 be profoundly impressed at the sight we had 

 seen. Here I was in a very real, a very modern 

 boat, with the honk of motor horns sounding 

 from the river road a few yards away through 

 the bushes, in the shade of this tropical vege- 

 tation in the year nineteen hundred and six- 

 teen ; and yet the curtain of the past had been 

 lifted and I had been permitted a glimpse of 

 what must have been common in the millions of 

 years ago. It was a tremendous thing, a won- 

 derful thing to have seen, and it seemed to 

 dwarf all the strange sights which had come to 

 me in all other parts of the earth's wilderness. 

 I had read of these habits and had expected 

 them, but like one's first sight of a volcano in 

 eruption, no reading or description prepares one 

 for the actual phenomenon. 



I sat silently watching for the re-appearance 

 of the young bird. We tallied five pairs of eyes 

 and yet many minutes passed before I saw the 

 same little head and emaciated neck sticking 

 out of the water alongside a bit of drift rub- 

 bish. The only visible thing was the protruding 

 spikes of the bedraggled tail feathers. I worked 

 the boat in toward the bird, half heartedly, for 

 I had made up my mind that this particular 

 brave little bit of atavism deserved his freedom, 

 so splendidly had he fought for it among the 

 pimplers. Soon he ducked forward, dived out 

 of sight and came up twenty feet away among 

 an inextricable tangle of vines. I sent a little 

 cheer of well wishing after him and we salvaged 

 Sam. 



Then we shoved out the boat and watched 

 from a distance. Five or six minutes passed 

 and a skinny, crooked, two-fingered mitten of 

 an arm reared upward out of the muddy flood 

 and the nestling, black and glistening, hauled 

 itself out of water. 



Thus must the first amphibian have climbed 

 out, shaken the water from its eyes and gasped 



in the thin air. But the young hoatzin neither 

 gasped nor shivered, and seemed as self pos- 

 sessed as if this was a common occurrence in 

 its life. There was not the slightest doubt how- 

 ever, that this was its first introduction to water. 

 Yet it had dived from a height of fifteen feet, 

 about fifty times its own length, as cleanly as 

 a seal leaps from a berg. It was as if a human 

 child should dive two hundred feet! 



In fifteen minutes more it had climbed high 

 above the water, and with unerring accuracy 

 directly toward its natal bundle of sticks over- 

 head. The mother now came close, and with 

 hoarse rasping notes and frantic heaves of tail 

 and wings lent encouragement. Just before we 

 paddled from sight, when the little fellow had 

 reached his last rung, he partly opened his beak 

 and gave a little falsetto cry, — a clear, high 

 tone, tailing off into a gutteral rasp. His splen- 

 did courage had broken at last ; he had nearly 

 reached the nest and he was aching to put aside 

 all this terrible responsibilitj^, this pitting of 

 his tiny might against such fearful odds. He 

 wanted to be a helpless nestling again, to crouch 

 on the springy bed of twigs with a feather com- 

 forter over him and be stuffed at will with de- 

 lectable pimpler pap. Such is the normal right 

 destiny of a hoatzin chick, and the wheee-og! 

 wrung from him by the re-action of safety, 

 seemed to voice all this. 



Our Gav'ial. — One of the rarest specimens on 

 exhibition in the Reptile House is the Indian 

 gavial, which arrived at the Park about five 

 years ago. This curious crocodilian has a much 

 elongated snout like the handle of a frying pan, 

 and the slender jaws generously studded with 

 long and very sharp teeth. The gavial is al- 

 leged to be an extremely delicate reptile in cap- 

 tivity, but our specimen has thriven from the 

 date of its arrival, and steadily increased in 

 size. It is now about seven feet long, having 

 increased about two feet in length while in the 

 Park. It is much more agile than alligators 

 and crocodiles and for that reason it is not safe 

 for a keeper to enter its enclosure. By some 

 authorities it is claimed that this species attains 

 the greatest length of any living reptile, thirty- 

 foot specimens having been recorded in its 

 habitat, the River Ganges, of northern India, 

 and its tributaries. 



