638 



THE TROPICAL WORLD. 



searched in his pocket for a knife. Not finding the weapon, he then seized the reptile 

 by the head, and pressed his fingers into its eyes — a method which saved Mungo 

 Park's negro from a similar fate. In this case, however, the monster did not let go 

 his hold, but disappearing under the surface with the Indian, came up again with him 

 as soon as he was drowned, and dragged the body to a neighboring island. " One 

 Sunday evening," says Waterton, '* as I was walking with Don Felipe de Yriarte, Gov- 

 ernor of Angostura, on the bank of the Orinoco — ' Stop here a minute or two,' said 

 he to me, ' while I recount a sad accident. One fine evening, last year, as the people 

 of Angostura were sauntering up and down in the Alameda, I was within twenty 

 yards of this place, when I saw a large Cayman rush out of the river, seize a man, 

 and carry him down, before anybody had it in his power to assist him. The screams 

 of the poor fellow were terrible, as the Cayman was running off with him. He plunged 

 into the river with his prey ; we instantly lost sight of him, and never saw or heard 

 him more.' " Humboldt also relates that, during the inundations of the Orinoco, alli- 

 gators will sometimes make their appearance in the very streets of Angostura, where 

 they have been known to attack and drag away a human prey. 



Even among each other, these ferocious animals frequently engage in deadly con- 

 flict. Thus Schomburgk once saw a prodigiously large Cayman seize one of a 

 smaller species by the middle of the body, so that the head and tail projected on both 

 sides of its muzzle. Now both of them disappeared under the surface, so that only 

 the agitated waters of the otherwise calm river announced the death-struggle going on 

 beneath ; and then again the monsters reappeared, wildly beating the surface ; so that 

 it was hardly possible to distinguish here a tail, or there a monstrous head, in the 

 seething whirlpool. At length, however, the tumult subsided, and the large Cayman 

 was seen leisurely swimming to a sand-bank, where he immediately began to feed 

 upon his prey. 



The same traveler relates an interesting example of the Cayman's tenacity of life. 

 One of them having been wounded with a strong harpoon, was dragged upon a sand- 

 bank. Here the rays of the sun seemed to infuse new life into the monster, for, 

 awaking from his death-like torpidity, he suddenly snapped about him with such rage 

 that Schomburgk and his assistants thought it prudent to retreat to a safer distance. 

 Seizing a long pole, the bravest of the Indians now went towards the Cayman, who 

 awaited the attack with wide-extended jaws, and plunged the stake deep into his maw 

 — a morsel which the brute did not seem to relish. Meanwhile two other Indians 

 approached him from behind, and kept striking him with thick clubs upon the extrem- 

 ity of the tail. At every blow upon this sensitive part, the monster bounded in the 

 air and extended his frightful jaws, which were each time immediately regaled with a 

 fresh thrust of the pole. After a long and furious battle, the Cayman, who measured 

 twelve feet in length, was at last slain. Another remarkable instance of the vitality 

 of the common crocodile is mentioned by Sir E. Tennent. A gentleman at Galle 

 having caught on a baited hook an unusually large one, it was disembowelled by his 

 coolies, the aperture in the stomach being left expanded by a stick placed across it. 

 On returning, in the afternoon, with a view to secure the head, they found that the 

 creature had crawled for some distance, and made its escape into the water. 



Like the sea- turtles, the crocodiles generally deposit their eggs, which are about the 

 size of those of a goose, and covered with a calcareous shell, in holes made in the 



