ZOOLOGY 
355 
The Crocodile is the most striking reptile in British Central Africa on account 
of its abundance and the enormous size to which some specimens attain. As 
far as we know there is but one species represented in this part of the continent, 
and that is the common African crocodile (Crocodilus niloticus). At the same 
time I would point out a fact which I have noticed here as in West Africa, that 
there are crocodiles apparently possessing the feature deemed peculiar to the 
alligators—that of two of the lower tusks at the extremity of the muzzle fitting 
into pits in the upper jaw on either side of the nostrils. I have frequently 
made efforts to send home a skull showing this, but some fatality always seemed 
to attend these specimens and either none came to hand or else the point I am 
now describing was already known to naturalists and was dismissed as of no 
particular interest 
The River Shire is a favourite haunt of these monsters which in that river are 
of exceptionally large size and great boldness. The power of their jaw is 
enormous. A crocodile which used to frequent the landing-place at Chikwawa 
on the Lower Shire (where it carried off many victims amongst the natives), one 
day rushed at an iron pail which was being let down into the river to draw up 
water. It seized the pail, crumpled it up in its mouth and drove great holes 
through the iron with its long teeth. The pail was withdrawn and for some 
time exhibited as an example of what a crocodile could bite through. At Fort 
Johnston, on the Upper Shire, near Lake Nyasa, the crocodiles would rush up 
to the very bank and seize people heedlessly standing near the water’s edge. 
Several of our Indian soldiers were killed in this way until the river bank was 
guarded by a palisade. The crocodile seldom eats its victim immediately it 
has been killed by drowning. It prefers to stow it away in some crevice or 
hiding-place under the water until it is partially decomposed. The normal diet 
of these reptiles is fish without which, of course, they would scarcely exist, as it 
is only a rare incident for them to capture a mammal of any size ; an incident 
which, given a number of crocodiles in any stream or lake, can only occur to 
each one at most once a year on an average. Curiously enough they do not 
appear to eat water birds. Some sportsmen have told me that when they shot 
ducks or geese and the birds fell into the water, the crocodiles have snapped 
them up, but such an incident has never been witnessed by myself. In lagoons 
and on sluggish rivers where the water is covered with floating pelicans, spur¬ 
winged geese, ducks of all kinds, cormorants and gulls, and in the shallower 
parts with innumerable wading birds, crocodiles are also present, their heads 
appearing just above the surface of the water, amongst the birds, or their bodies 
laid out in the sun on sand banks or propped against stranded trees. On the 
sand they may be seen lying fast asleep while water birds of all descriptions 
are standing about them. I confess except in the case of the spur-winged 
plover which warns the crocodile of danger, I cannot understand why this 
pact should exist between the graceful and the grotesque, and why birds 
should enjoy an immunity denied to mammals. Yet it is true that mammals 
can co-exist with crocodiles in the water, for otters are very plentiful on the 
Upper Shire and the crocodile'and hippopotamus do not appear to fall foul 
of one another. Yet men, baboons, lions, leopards, antelopes of all kinds 
approaching the water’s edge are liable to be seized and dragged under by 
the crocodile. 
Although so many natives lose their lives every year as victims of the 
crocodile the negroes of Central Africa are singularly careless of danger in this 
respect. As a rule the crocodile never attacks human beings when there are a 
