THE NILE CROCODILE 



(Crocodiles niloticus) 



TO the ancient Egyptians the timsa, or Nile crocodile, the champsa of 

 Herodotus, was a familiar reptile ; but from the lower and middle portion 

 of the Nile, as far up as Thebes, the species has long since been exter- 

 minated, although it is still abundant in East and South Africa. Elsewhere it 

 occurs in Madagascar, and still survives, although sparingly, in Syria, more 

 especially in the Zerka (= Crocodile) River near Caesarea. In Biblical times crocodiles 

 were, however, abundant in the Holy Land; and there is little doubt that the 

 "leviathan" of the Book of Job refers to these noisome reptiles. Till nearly the 

 fifteenth century it also seems that crocodiles lived in Greece and the Isles of the 

 Grecian Archipelago ; and at that date a huge crocodile's skull was jealously 

 preserved and exhibited at Rhodes. It is these ancient south European crocodiles 

 which probably gave rise to the legend of St. George and the Dragon and other 

 myths of a kindred nature. 



In popular estimation there is much confusion between crocodiles and 

 alligators ; and in India the former are almost invariably called alligators, although 

 there is not a single representative of that group in the whole country. Indeed, 

 alligators are confined to China and America ; those of South America, properly 

 known as caimans, differing from the typical Mississippi species by having a bony 

 armour on the under as well as on the upper surface. There are many characters 

 distinguishing crocodiles from alligators ; one of the most easily recognised being 

 that the fourth lower tooth of a crocodile bites into a notch on the outer side of the 

 upper jaw, so that its summit is visible when the mouth is closed, whereas in an 

 alligator the corresponding tooth is received into a pit, so that the tip is completely 

 concealed when the reptile shuts its enormous mouth. 



True crocodiles, which, with alligators, caimans, and gavials, are the largest 

 of living reptiles, are now represented by about eleven species, whose combined 

 range includes Africa, southern Asia, northern Australia, and tropical America. 

 India possesses two species, the broad-nosed muggar {Crocodilus palustris), and 

 the narrow-nosed estuarine crocodile (C. ftorosus) ; the former of which ranges 

 to Ceylon, Burma, and the Malay Peninsula and Islands, while the latter, which 

 enters salt-water freely, and is sometimes found far out to sea, extends from 

 India, Ceylon, and the south of China to northern Australia and the Solomon and 

 Fiji Islands. 



Crocodiles may grow to a length of 18 and probably 20 feet or more, and 

 are powerful creatures, which are the pests of the waters they frequent, seizing 



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