COMMON CROCODILE. 



189 



Rolls his fierce eye-balls, clasps his iron claws, 

 And champs with gnashing teeth his massy jaws. 

 Old Nilus sighs thro* all his cane-crown'd shores. 

 And swarthy Memphis trembles and adores/' 



In the large rivers of Africa Crocodiles are said 

 to be sometimes seen swimming together in vast 

 shoals, and resembling the trunks of so many 

 large trees floating on the v/ater. The negroes 

 will sometimes attack and kill a single Crocodile, 

 by stabbing it under the belly, where the skin, at 

 the interstices of the scales, is soft and flexible. 

 It is also, in some countries, the custom to hunt 

 the Crocodile by means of strong dogs, properly 

 trained to the purpose, and armed with spiked 

 collars. It is likewise pretended, that in some 

 parts of Africa Crocodiles are occasionally tamed ; 

 and it is said that they form an article of Royal 

 magnificence with the Monarchs of those regions; 

 being kept in large ponds or lakes appropriated to 

 their residence. We may add, that the ancient 

 Romans exhibited these animals in their public 

 spectacles and triumphs. Scaurus, during his 

 ^dileship, treated the people with a sight of fivq 

 Crocodiles, exhibited in a temporary lake, and 

 Augustus introduced one into his triumph over 

 Cleopatra, as well as several others, for the enter- 

 tainment of the people. 



A vulgar error seems to have long prevailed re- 

 lative to this animal's moving his upper jaw. This 

 error seems to have been first rectified by Grew, 

 in his description of the skeleton of a Crocodile 



