THE CAYMAN. 



57 



place, and begged my attention to what he was 

 going to relate, " Don Carlos," said he to me, 

 " mark the opening which leads to the Oro- 

 noque. I was on this very spot, a great 

 number of the inhabitants being present, when 

 there suddenly came out of the river an enor- 

 mous cayman. It seized a man close by me, 

 and carried him off to the water, where it sank 

 with him to appear no more. The attack was 

 so sudden, and the animal so tremendous, that 

 none of us had either time or courage to go to 

 the unfortunate man's rescue." 



This certainly could not have been one of 

 Master Swainson's " slow-paced and even timid 

 animals," which " an active boy armed with a 

 small hatchet " might easily have despatched. 



In 1824, I read in one of the newspapers at 

 New York, a detailed account of the death of 

 one of our consul's sons. The youth would 

 bathe in th$ river Madalena, in opposition to 

 all that the Spaniards could say against so rash 

 an act, on account of the numbers and ferocity 

 of the caymans there. He had not fairly 

 entered the water, when he was seized by a 

 cayman and disappeared for ever. 



How these dismal exhibitions of cayman 



