CROCODILE, WELL ILLUSTRATING THE CHARACTER OF THE DENTITION.
The lower tusk-like teeth fit into notches in the upper jaw, and are visible when the mouth is closed. In the alligator these teeth fit into pits in the upper jaw, and are hidden from view under the like conditions.
Photo by Scholastic Photo. Co.] [Parson's Green.
CROCODILES AND ALLIGATORS, WITH YOUNG.
Notwithstanding their proverbially irascible dispositions, these reptiles, of all ages and dimensions, herd together on the most amiable terms.
The method adopted in Queensland and North Australia for capturing these destructive monsters is that of a running noose, so attached to a suitably flexible mangrove-tree growing in the vicinity of its nocturnal runs as to constitute a gigantic spring-trap. A dead carcase or other suitable bait is added to lure the animal to its doom. The crocodiles thus caught are alive and uninjured, and can be dispatched or reserved for menagerie exhibition. A somewhat amusing incident attended the transport of a "reprieved" captive by steamship from Cairns to Brisbane, Queensland, a few years since. In the dead of night, when all but the watch and engineer had retired to rest (they have to anchor and lay-to at night in the Great Barrier Reef channels), the saurian managed to free himself from his bonds, and started on a voyage of discovery around the decks. Arriving at the stoke-hold, he either incontinently stumbled into it, or descended of malice prepense, sniffing the chance of a supper or a good joke at the engineer's expense. Anyway, the engineer was aroused from his peaceful dozings with the impression that the last day of reckoning had arrived, and, rushing up the hatchway, awakened the whole ship's strength with his frantic outcries.
The Nile Crocodile, the most familiar form in European menageries, and once abundant throughout Egypt to the Nile's delta, has now retired to the upper reaches of that great river. It never attains to the dimensions of the estuarine form. By the ancient Egyptians, as is well known, this species was pampered and worshipped with divine honours while living, and after death embalmed and preserved in the catacombs.
Photo by Robert D. Carson, Esq.] [Philadelphia.