986 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXVIU. 
are swollen during the rainy season. The vegetation becomes here at once- 
more varied and is specially characterised by the stemless palm, Nij>a JruticansN 
All the main streams of the islands ajjpear to terminate in a similiar manner 
and although the term river is a euphemism when applied to Alligator River 
there seems to be little doubt that its cognomen is more or less justified. No 
alligator, sensu slricto, is known to occur nearer tb/an Chuia, but crocodiles 
almost certainly occur in this locality. Although J-iievtlr saw one myself,, 
the natives assm’ed me that they were to be foimd here and that their dogs, 
are afraid to enter the water, as on several occasions one has been taken by 
these animals. Accordmg to local information these crocodiles are small, 
measurmg live to six feet in length. Boden Kloss | records having seen one 
at the mouth of a jheel in Great Nicobar which measured about 10 feet in length 
and was brilliantly marked with yellow. One of the earliest references to the 
occm'rence of these animals that I have seen is contained in a letter from the 
Rev. Gottfried Haensel, who was a missionary in these parts and who left the 
islands in 1787. To quote his own w'ords,-“ One of the most formidable animals 
with which these islands abound is the crocodile or alligator. Car Nicobar 
is overrun with them as are all the other Nicobar Islands, which have 
fresh water lakes and streams. They are of two kinds, the black kayman 
and the proper crocodile.” The “ black kayman” that he refers to is almost 
certainly the large lizard, Varanus salvator, that is comparatively common 
and attams to a great size, the largest that I have seen measuring seven feet 
four inches in length. The colour of this Varanus is black with j’ellow markmgs 
over the sides and back : they readily enter w'ater when distiurbed or pursued 
and I am inclined to suspect that it was one of these that Boden Kloss mistook 
for a crocodile. The frequency with which the crocodile is depicted on the 
pamted ‘ scare devils ’ proves however that the natives are well acquainted 
with the animal and Blyth§ referred a specimen examined by him to the species 
Crocodilus biporcatus {= C. porosus.). 
The coral reefs aromid these islands are all of the nature of fringing reef's 
and along the sheltered east coast of Camorta and Nankauri Islands these extend 
out for several hundred yards from the coast line proper. At their sea-ward 
edge these reefs arise almost vertically from a depth of 15-20 fht-hoins to within 
a few- feet of the surface and even on a calm day with little or no wind blowing, 
the rise and fall of the swell causes such a rush of water over the edge of the reef 
that one realizes how easity in rough weather fragments of coral may be torn 
off and hurled shorew'ards over the reef to assist in the formation of the mud- 
flat beyond. When the sea is calm one can look do\ni through the water and 
see numerous gaudy-coloimed fish swdmming backwards and forwards among 
the growing coral masses, w-hile the surface of the reef-face is dotted 
over with large crinoids, of a black or greenish yellow colour, the delicate 
arms of which look like ferns growing out of crevices in a wall. Liside the grow- 
ing edge of the reef the sea bottom consists of fragments of coral-debris on 
which scattered isolated colonies of living coral or masses of alcyonarians still 
maintain their existence. Still further inshore the bottom consists of soft mud 
or a mixture of mud and sand, which completely kills off all coral growTh but 
forms a suitable soil for the growth of several different kinds of sea-weed. 
The quantity of sea-weed around these islands forms a marked contrast to 
the coral reefs and mud flats of the Burma coast, where weed of any kind is for 
the most part absent. Each of these weed patches has a fauna that is quite its 
o%vn, distinguished by the various different schemes of protective colomation. 
Thus on red weed we find numerous red-coloured holothm’ians, while sheltering 
J C. Boden Kloss, “ In the Andamans and Nicobars,” p. G9. 
§ Blyth, E., “ Notes on the Fauna of the Nicobar I.slands”. Selections from 
Records of the Government of India, Home Department, Vol. LXXVII, Calcutta, 1870. 
