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IHI: CATMAIT. 
acutus, Cuv.) ; tlieir colour was dark-green on tke back, and 
v liite below the belly, with yellow spots on the flanks. 1 
counted, as in all the real crocodiles, thirty-eight teeth in 
the upper jaw, and tlyrty in the lower ; in the former, the 
tenth and ninth; and in the latter, the first and fourth, were 
the largest. In tlie description made by M. Bonpland and 
myself, on the spot, we have expressly marked that the lower 
i’ourth tooth rises over the upper jaw. The posterior ex- 
tremities were palmated. Tlicse crocodiles of Batabano 
appeared to us to bo speciiically identical with the Crocodilus 
acutus. It is true that the' accounts we heard of their 
habits did not quite agree witli what we had ourselves 
observed on the Orinoco ; but carnivorous reptiles of the 
same species are milder and more timid, or fiercer and more 
courageous, in the same river, according to the nature of the 
localities. The animal called the cayman, at Batabano, died 
on the way, and was not brought to us, so that wo could 
make no comparison of the two species.* I have no doubt 
that the crocodile with a sharp snout, and the alligator or 
cayman with a snout like a pike,t inhabit together, but 
in distinct bands, the marshy coast between Xagua, the 
iSiirgidero of Batabano, and 'the island of Pinos. In that 
island Bampier was struck with the great diflereuce between 
the caymans and the American crocodiles. After having 
described, though not al\i ays with perfect correctness, several 
of the characteristics which distinguish crocodiles from 
caymans, he traces the geographical distribution of those 
enormous saurians. “ In the bay of Campeachv,” he says, 
“ I saw only caymans or alligators ; at the island of Great 
fay man, there are crocodiles and no alligators ; at the 
i.sland of Pinos, and in the innumerable creeks of the coast 
* Ihe four bags filled with musk (bolzas del almizcle) are, in the cro- 
codile of Batabano, exactly in the same position as in that of the Kio 
Magdalena, beneath the lower jaw- and near the anus. I was much 
surprised at not perceiving the smell of musk at the Havannah, three 
tlays alter the death of the animal, in a temperature of 30°, while at 
Mompox, on the banks of the Magdalena, living crocodiles infected our 
apartment. I have since found, that Dampier also remarked “ an absence 
of smell in the crocodile of Cuba, where the caymans spread a very strong 
smell of musk.” 
t Crot-odilus acutus of .San Domingo. Alligator lueius of Florida anc 
the Mississippi. 
