410 DESCRIPTION OF BATAVIA CHAP, XVII 
commands upon him, and that if he neglects to fulfil them, 
he will certainly suffer sickness or death as a punishment 
for his inattention. Consequently he begins to labour over 
in his brains all the circumstances of his dream, and try his 
utmost to put some explanation or other upon them. In 
this, if he fails, he sends for the cawin or priest, who assists 
him to interpret them. Sometimes Satan orders him to do 
this thing or that, but generally he wants either meat or 
money, which is always sent him, and hung upon a little 
plate made of cocoanut leaves on the boughs of a tree, near 
the river. I have asked them what they thought the devil 
did with money, and whether or no they thought that he 
ate the victuals. As for the money, they said, so that the 
man ordered to do so did but part with it, it signified not 
who took it, therefore it was generally a prey to the first 
stranger who found it; and the meat he did not eat, but 
bringing his mouth near it, he at once sucked all the savour 
out of it, without disturbing its position in the least, but 
rendering it as tasteless as water. 
But what is more difficult to reconcile to the rules of 
human reason, is the belief that these people have, that 
women who bring forth children sometimes bring forth at 
the same time young crocodiles as twins to the children. 
These creatures are received by the midwives most carefully, 
and immediately carried down to the river, where they are 
turned loose, but have victuals supplied them constantly 
from the family, especially the twin, who is obliged to 
go down to the river every now and then, and give meat 
to this sudara, as it is called. The latter, if he is deprived of 
such attendance, constantly afflicts his relation with sickness. 
The existence of an opinion so contrary to human reason, 
and which seemed totally unconnected with religion, was 
with me long a subject of doubt, but the universal testimony 
of every Indian I ever heard speak of it was not to be 
withstood. It seems to have taken its rise in the islands of 
Celebes and Bouton, very many of the inhabitants of which 
have crocodiles in their families; from thence it has spread 
all over the eastern islands, even to Timor and Ceram, and 
