CROCODILE. 
and swallowed by the devouring Crocodiles. 
The horrid noise of their closing jaws ; their 
plunging amidst the broken banks of fish, and 
rising, with their prey, some feet upright above 
the water ; the floods of water and blood rush- 
ing out of their mouths ; and the clouds of 
vapour issuing from their wide nostrils ; were 
truly frightful." 
Catesby says, ** it is to be adinired; that so 
vast an animal should at hrst.be contained In 
an egg no bigger than that of a turkey." 
The female, according to Bartram, lays a 
floor of tempered mortar on the ground, com- 
posed of mud, grass, and herbage, on which 
she deposits a layer of eggs ; and, on this, a 
stratum of mortar seven or eight inches thick, 
and then another iaver of eggs : and, in this 
manner, from day to day, one stratum above 
another, till she has formed a nest or hillock, 
in the form of an obtuse cone, or hay- cock, 
four feet high, and four or nve feet diameter 
at the base, containing from one to two hun- 
dred ecrcrs. These are hatched bv the heat of 
the sun ; or, perhaps," remarks Eartram^ 
** the vegetable substance, mixed with the 
earth, being a£tcd on by the sun, may cause a 
small 
