322 MAKOLOLO AND CROCODILE. Chap. XII. 



of fish, scarcely ever " attacked man. The Shire teems 

 with fish of many different kinds. The only time, as 

 already remarked, when its crocodiles are particularly to 

 be dreaded, is when the river is in flood. Then the fish 

 are driven from their nsual haunts, and no game comes 

 down to the river to drink, water being abundant in pools 

 inland. Hunger now impels the crocodile to lie in wait 

 for the women who come to draw water, and on the 

 Zambesi numbers are carried off every year. The danger 

 is not so great at other seasons ; though it is never safe to 

 bathe, or to stoop to drink, where one cannot see the 

 bottom, especially in the evening. One of the Makololo 

 ran down in the dusk of the river ; and, as he was busy 

 tossing the water to his mouth with his hand, in the 

 manner peculiar to the natives, a crocodile rose suddenly 

 from the bottom, and caught him by the hand. The limb 

 of a tree was fortunately within reach, and he had 

 presence of mind to lay hold of it. Both tugged and 

 pulled ; the crocodile for his dinner, and the man for dear 

 life. For a time it appeared doubtful whether a dinner 

 or a life was to be sacrificed ; but the man held on, and 

 the monster let the hand go, leaving the deep marks of 

 his ugly teeth in it. 



During our detention, in expectation of the permanent 

 rise of the river in March, Dr. Kirk and Mr. C. Living- 

 stone collected numbers of the wading-birds of the 

 marshes — and made pleasant additions to our salted pro- 

 visions, in geese, ducks, and hippopotamus flesh. One of 

 the comb or knob-nosed geese, on being strangled in order 

 to have its skin preserved without injury, continued to 

 breathe audibly by the broken humerus, or wing-bone, 

 and other means had to be adopted to put it out of pain. 

 This was as if a man on the gallows were to continue to 

 breathe by a broken armbone, and afforded us an illus- 

 tration of the fact, that in birds, the vital air penetrates 



