334 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE.

seas. The Leathery Turtle is said to reach eight feet in length
and a weight of a thousand pounds. The Loggerhead Turtle
is even larger than this, and sometimes weighs as much as
fifteen hundred pounds,

ORDER II. The Crocodile and the Alligator belong

The Crocodile. respectively to the Eastern and the Western
Worlds. The former infests the rivers of Africa and Asia,
one species at least belonging to Australia. Some of the
best known varieties are those of the river Nile, the Gavia!
of the Ganges being also among the more familiar species.
These formidable and unwieldy monsters grow to an immense
size, sometimes attaining to a length of twenty-five feet.
Their enormous jaws and innumerable sharp teeth (they
sometimes number a hundred) give them a terrible appear-
ance, while their hard scaly coats are invulnerable against
ordinary attack. Their point of weakness is their unwieldy
character, taking advantage of which the natives will dive
beneath them and stab them with knives in vulnerable parts.
The huntsman aims at their eyes as being the nearest approach
to their brains. Mungo Park relates that one of his guides
across the river Gambia was suddenly seized by a Crocodile
and pulled under the water; upon which the negro thrust
his fingers into the animal’s eyes with such violence that it
quitted its hold, but seizing him again, he resorted to the
same expedient and with more success, as it again released
him, appeared stupified, and then swam down the river.
This man reached the bank bleeding very much, with long
and déep wounds in his thighs, which incapacitated him for
travel for six days. The crocodile lays an enormous number
of eggs on the banks of its native rivers, but most of these
are prevented from maturing by the birds and animals which
prey upon them. Mrs. Bowdich tells an amusing story of a
merchant who packed some crocodiles’ eggs in sand for ship-
ment to England and placed the barrel containing them with
other goods in his warehouse. Strange and unaccountable