Part 4

THE CROCODILE.

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THE crocodile and its very near relative, the alligator, possess a double interest to man. In the first place, they are the relics of a bygone age. Their cousins, the ichthyosaurus and the plesiosaurus, and the other great Saurians, have happily long since vanished from the world, but the crocodile is still with us, and doubtless retains traditions of the days when he and his relatives ranged undisputed masters of a swampy universe, undisturbed even by anticipations of changes and cataclysms that should render the world an unsuitable place of habitation for, at any rate, the larger species among them. The second reason for man’s interest in the crocodile is the crocodile’s marked partiality for man. The crocodile and the alligator differ very slightly from each other; the principal difference being that the alligator has a broader head, and that the hind feet of the crocodile are much more completely webbed than are those of the alligator.

The general observer, however, would see no greater differences between members of the various species of alligators and crocodiles than between different human beings; but the scientific man delights in subtleties, and there is nothing that affords him a deeper satisfaction than in discovering slight peculiarities and differences that enable him to divide and subdivide, to invent fresh hard names, and so to deter as far as possible the general mob from the study of the subject. As, roughly speaking, the crocodile inhabits chiefly the Old World, while the alligator has almost a monopoly of the New, the former was naturally first known to man, and was an object at once of fear and admiration. Its mouth was so much larger than that of man, and its armour so much more perfect than anything that man could contrive, that it is easy to understand the admiration it excited. Our first written record of it is in Job; and it is there, under the name of Leviathan, spoken of as the bravest and most formidable of all creatures, as “a king over all the children of pride.” The Egyptians, who were given to worship animals, and perhaps saw more of the crocodile than they liked, did their best to win its goodwill, and elevated it to the rank of a deity. Their tame crocodiles were well cared for; and although perhaps these did not derive any very lively satisfaction from being adorned with rings of gold and precious stones, they doubtless appreciated the abundant food with which they were supplied, and the feasts of cake, roast meat, and mulled wine occasionally bestowed upon them. The Indian variety have had an equally good time of it, and their reputation in that part of the world has lasted longer than in Egypt, and indeed still continues, large numbers being kept in tanks belonging to some of the temples, still regarded as sacred, and fed abundantly.

The alligator of Northern and Southern America, although it has always been held in great respect by the natives, has scarcely risen to the lofty position occupied by its Eastern cousins. It has, nevertheless, held its own, being too formidable and well defended to be interfered with with impunity. Although killed and eaten occasionally, it was as a rule left severely alone, its flesh having a musty flavour, that needs a strong stomach and long familiarity to appreciate. Of late, however, evil times have fallen upon the alligator. A use has been found for it. So long as the dead crocodile was considered as worthless, save for the somewhat disagreeable food it furnished, so long the alligator was safe; but it was otherwise as soon as it was discovered that a portion of it was a marketable commodity. Some close investigator remarked that under its coat of mail it wore a leathern doublet exactly corresponding to it, and found that this doublet was capable of being turned into an excellent peculiarly-marked leather. From that day the fate of the alligator was sealed. It will doubtless be a long time before it is exterminated, even in the United States; but, like the bison, it has to go. Already on the rivers where the population is comparatively thick it has become rare, and even in the swamps where it formerly was undisputed master the search is hot for it. Theoretically this will be a matter for regret; practically its loss will not be sensibly felt.

It may be owned that the alligator has been to some extent maligned, and that the number of human beings destroyed by it was by no means so great as its exceeding numbers in some of the sluggish rivers of the Southern States or of South America would warrant one in expecting. Nevertheless, it was certainly a very formidable foe, and a swimmer attacked by it had but small chance of escape. Unlike the shark, the crocodile kills its prey by drowning; the shark can take off a limb with a single bite, the alligator has no such power. Its teeth are sharp and pointed, but placed at irregular distances apart, and though these can wound and lacerate sorely they have no cutting power whatever, and when it has captured and drowned a prey too large to be swallowed at a mouthful, hides it up in a deep hole or under the river bank until it decomposes sufficiently for the reptile to be able to tear it in pieces. It is said that any one seized by an alligator or crocodile can, if he possess a sufficient amount of presence of mind, compel the creature to let go by thrusting his thumbs into its one vulnerable point—its eyes. The experiment, however, is one that cannot be recommended. It would doubtless be interesting, but, like Alpine climbing, the satisfaction of success would scarcely compensate for the risk incurred.

In no creature have the defensive powers been carried to the same perfection as in the case of the crocodile: its coat of armour is absolutely invulnerable to the weapons that it was intended to withstand; and even now that man has armed himself with rifles, he is unable to penetrate its defence unless the creature is struck in the eye or in the thick skin of its leg-joints, which are comparatively exposed. The coat of mail, doubtless, possesses certain disadvantages, as did the armour worn by the knights of the Middle Ages; while this was proof against missiles of all kinds, against sword and dagger, the knight, if unhorsed and hurled to the ground, was unable to rise without assistance, and lay a helpless victim to the dagger of the meanest camp-follower. So it is with the crocodile; it can turn its head but at a slight angle with its body, and can turn itself only by means of a long détour; hence an active man or an animal of any kind can easily escape it, unless suddenly seized or knocked over by the sweep of its tail.

The crocodile possesses many amiable qualities. It is an excellent mother. It does not indeed sit upon its eggs like a hen, but this is simply because it knows that the heat of the sand in which it buries them is amply sufficient to hatch them. The earlier crocodiles, which doubtless followed the example of birds, would speedily discover that what was good for the goose was not good for the crocodile, and that while but a small supply of heat passed through their armour, its weight was disastrous to the wellbeing of the eggs. The crocodile, however, carefully guards the buried eggs, and as soon as they are hatched watches over the young with anxious and continued care; she escorts them to the water, and once there protects them to the utmost of her power from all assailants, among whom, it must be admitted with regret, the male crocodile figures prominently. This care on the part of the mother continues during many months of the young crocodile’s life. In spite of this, only a small proportion of them arrive at maturity, for in their early days great numbers fall victims to vultures and other birds during their rambles on shore. Like all saurians, the crocodile is partial to warmth, and as it is capable of prolonged fastings it is able to spend a considerable portion of its life basking or asleep on the sands in the sun.

The crocodile’s eye is provided with three distinct lids. It is evident that this advantage admits of an extraordinary variety of what may be called eye-action, and it is probable that these animals are able to converse with each other by means of the varied action of the lids. Man is able to convey a great deal of expression by the action of a single eyelid, and it is reasonable to suppose that the alligator would not have been provided with a triple eyelid had it not been able to utilise these coverings in a very marked manner. It is strange and somewhat unfortunate that this peculiarity should not have been made the subject of much further investigation and research by scientific men than has hitherto been bestowed upon it. It is evident indeed that we have still much to learn concerning the crocodile; and in view of its early disappearance, it is to be hoped that the matter will speedily be taken in hand by some trained investigator.

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THE CAMEL.

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DURING the countless ages that must have elapsed in its upward progress from the original germ, by the various processes of the survival of the fittest, selection, and adaptability to circumstances, it is clear that the camel kept its eyes strictly to business. The object of the germ and its descendants was to build up an animal that should be capable of enjoying existence in the desert. To this they turned all their attention, with, it may be admitted, marvellous success; but it must be added that, while so doing, they unaccountably neglected the beautiful, and turned out a creature which in point of awkwardness and uncouthness stands completely apart from the rest of the brute creation. The camel’s wide, spongy feet save it from sinking in the sand, its long neck enables it either to allay irritation by gnawing itself down its spine to the root of its tail, or to grab a rider by the foot, while its hind legs are specially adapted by their length to allow it to scratch itself behind the ear. It may be admitted that in these respects few animals have its advantages. As a provision against sand storms it has the unique faculty of being able entirely to close its nostrils; while by complicated internal arrangements it is able to carry its water supply about with it for some days. Probably the camel did not foresee that, while thus little by little perfecting itself for a life in the desert, it was constructing an animal that would be exceedingly useful to man, and was preparing for itself and its descendants a lifelong servitude; but so it has been. The camel was one of the very first animals that man turned to his use. Jacob possessed camels, and Joseph was carried away into Egypt by a caravan of Ishmaelites with laden camels. Job possessed three thousand camels at the beginning of his misfortunes, and was promised six thousand at the end. The camel has, in fact, from the first been made a servant by man; it is only in Central Asia that it is known to exist in a wild state, and it is far more probable that these wild camels are the descendants of some escaped from captivity, than that they should all along have retained their freedom.

The camel is capable of great and prolonged endurance if not overloaded or overdriven; but it is a mistake to suppose that there are no limits to its powers in this way. The authorities of the Nile Expedition fell into this error, with the result that in three weeks after its start from Korti, the four thousand camels collected and brought up at so great an expense were all practically hors-de-combat, more than half being dead and the rest reduced to the last stage of misery and weakness. The camel on this occasion showed its usual obstinacy, and insisted on dying as a protest against being obliged to travel night and day with utterly insufficient quantities of food and water. A similar result followed the confidence of the authorities of the Abyssinian Expedition in the power of the camel to exist without water when dumped down by thousands on the bare sands of Annesley Bay. The failure of the camel upon these occasions must not, however, be imputed to it as blame. In its progress from the germ it had anticipated only the conditions under which it would naturally find itself, and had made no allowance for the stupidity of man.

It is not surprising that the camel, finding itself from the first reduced to slavery and converted into a beast of burden, should have developed a bad temper. No epithet was ever more ridiculously misapplied than that of patience in connection with the camel. It is, in fact, only possible to account for its use upon the ground that when first applied the word bore its strict Latin signification, and that it was the “suffering” and not the “long-suffering” signification of the word that renders it applicable. The life of the camel is spent in one long protest against its lot. It grumbles and growls alike when it is laden and unladen, when it is ordered to rise or to kneel; to stop or to go on; it roars threateningly at any animal that approaches it, and is ready at all times to take a piece out of any one who may place himself incautiously within reach of its teeth, and even when lying down will shoot out its hind leg with wonderful activity and viciousness to a distance of some two or three yards at a passer-by. The camel has literally no pleasures; its life is one unbroken round of toil, and it would seem almost that it has cultivated ill-temper until it has become a form of enjoyment. Even the camel’s walk is evidently the result of deep calculation, for it is of all kinds of gait the most unpleasant for its rider. The camel has its regular pace,—it will walk two miles and three-quarters an hour, neither faster nor slower,—and however urgent the need of haste may be to its owner, neither blows nor execrations will induce the camel to quicken its pace except for a few hundred yards, at the end of which it will settle down into its regulation stride, with doubtless much inward chuckling at its rider’s exasperation. It would not be fair to blame the camel for this; its disposition has been embittered, and it is not unreasonable that it should find an alleviation in the only way open to it. Indeed, man has much reason to be grateful that the obstinacy of the camel does not take the form of refusing from the first to live, rejecting sustenance, and persisting in giving the whole thing up as soon as its eyes are open to the lot awaiting it.

There are breeds of camels that differ materially from the ordinary specimen in point of speed. The Heirie or Maherry, and the Sabaye, are very swift, and will keep up a trot of eight or nine miles an hour for many hours together, and have been known to perform a journey of thirty-five days’ caravan travelling in five days, doing six hundred and thirty miles; while Purchas says that camels will carry messages from Timbuktu to places nine hundred miles distant in less than eight days. These fast camels have but one hump; but this is also the case with some of the beasts of burden. The object of these humps is not very clear, but it is supposed that as the stomachs are a reservoir of water, so the humps are natural portmanteaus in which the animals convey a reserve of sustenance to draw upon in case of need. It is, at any rate, certain that the fatty substance composing the humps considerably diminishes and dwindles when the animal is overworked.

The camel has courage as well as endurance: it goes on at its regular pace like a clock that is wound up, until it stops suddenly and falls; when it once does so, nothing can induce it to endeavour to use its feet again as long as man is present, although after the departure of the caravan it has been known to get up to browse on the bushes, and to find its way back to the wells from which it started in the morning. It is very insensible to pain. Count Gleichen, in his account of the Camel Corps in the Nile Expedition, gives many instances of this; notably the case of one camel which, having had its lower jaw shot off by a ball from an Arab matchlock, yet continued its journey to the end of the day in apparent unconsciousness that anything unusual had taken place. The one form of enjoyment of the camel is that dear also to the donkey and horse—namely, a roll in the sand. This appears to afford it great comfort and consolation, and after an indulgence in it, it is ready, when again loaded, to start with renewed vigour. The Heirie, being better treated and cared for than the ordinary camel, is naturally a very much better tempered beast than his humble congener, and is even capable of exhibiting an affection for his master. This is in itself a proof that the moroseness of disposition so general in the race is due to the treatment they receive from man, and not from any inherent incapacity to see things on their bright side; and the thoughtful should pity rather than blame camels for using their only available means of exhibiting their disgust and discontentment with their hard and joyless lot.

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THE DONKEY.

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WHILE the dog has risen vastly in the scale since Scriptural times as the friend and companion of man, the donkey has as distinctly descended. There is no reason for believing that this is the fault of the donkey, but lies rather in the want of appreciation on the part of man. The donkey is, indeed, to no small extent the victim of appearances, and it can hardly be doubted that the length of his ears has told terribly against him. This is not because there is anything inherently objectionable in a donkey’s ears. They match admirably with his general appearance, and their constant movement evinces the animal’s intelligent interest in what is going on around it. Unfortunately for the donkey, however, men are accustomed to see in all other creatures’ ears bearing a smaller proportion to the general bulk than they do in the case of a donkey, and, therefore, rashly and foolishly, jump at the conclusion that the donkey’s ears are excessive. This being once established, it naturally follows that man should attribute various bad qualities to the donkey, simply because his ears are large; but he is specially credited with stupidity and obstinacy. We do not hesitate to say that the stupidity is very much greater on the part of man, who fails to recognise the characteristics of one of the most worthy of animals, than on that of the donkey himself; for it may be doubted whether any individual of the animal creation possesses so many virtues as he does. He is strong, hardy, patient, laborious, and, in his wild state, fleet and brave. He can live on the most meagre provender; he can stand all climates. He is a willing servant, and does not despise humble work. He is affectionate whenever he gets a chance of being so, and is one of the most intelligent of animals. The horse is more showy, but in proportion to the amount of food he consumes, and to his weight and size, he is less strong than the donkey; he is undoubtedly less intelligent, and, in spite of his size, he is no fleeter. The wild ass can leave the horse behind him; can climb precipices inaccessible to his rival, can go fearlessly along mountain paths where the horse would not dare to tread, and is in no way inferior in courage. Well groomed and cared for, his coat is almost as sleek and glossy; while he is free from the various vices that so often mar the usefulness of the horse.

When living under similar conditions, the horse recognises at once the superior sagacity of the ass. On the great ranches of the Western States of America donkeys are frequently turned out with droves of horses, and in such cases the donkey is always accepted as the leader, and the horses gather round him, or follow his footsteps with implicit confidence. The wild stallion on the plains is a very formidable animal, and is more than a match for man himself when unprovided with firearms; but the ass has no fear of it, and the testimony of the plains’ men is unanimous that in a combat between them the jack is likely to come out the victor. In such cases the donkey is well aware that he is no match for the stallion with his heels, but fights with his teeth, and the combat resembles that between a well-trained dog and a bull. The jackass will rush at his opponent, and, skilfully dodging the blows from its fore legs, will leap at its throat, and, having once caught hold, his grip cannot be shaken off. In vain will the stallion strike at him, in vain lift him in the air and hurl him down again, for the jack, with his legs well apart, will always come down on his feet. In vain will the horse throw itself down and roll with its opponent. The jack will hold on until the horse succumbs to his grip, or the flesh he has seized comes away in his hold.

Seeing his utility to man, his willingness to give all his strength for so slight a return, his patience under hardship, starvation, and cold, it is wonderful that the ass is not more highly appreciated, and that he does not occupy a far higher place than he does in our regard. In one respect only has the ass a weak side. If, as the philosopher says, silence is golden in the case of man, it is still more so in the case of the ass. The donkey prides himself, not upon his many and sterling virtues, but upon what others consider to be his greatest failing. Unfortunately, like many human beings, he entertains an altogether mistaken idea as to his vocal powers, which he never loses an opportunity of exhibiting. Other animals use the voice for the purpose of expressing their emotions. The dog’s bark expresses joy, watchfulness, or menace; his growl, anger; his whine, impatience or discontent. The horse is naturally silent, but his neigh is indicative sometimes of welcome, sometimes of impatience. Love is the burden of the bird’s song. Maternal solicitude, or a desire for food, that of the baa of the sheep. The donkey’s song appears to express nothing but his desire to favour all within hearing with a specimen of the beauty and power of his voice, and of his amazing vocalisation. Thus he lifts it up at all times, and in all places, whenever the idea seizes him, and the utmost intelligence of man has hitherto failed to grasp the meaning of the strange, varied, and prolonged cachinnations. The boldest animal trembles when it hears them. Man puts his hands to his ears, and flies. It is not a challenge, it is not a call; it is indicative neither of hunger, nor of anger, nor of satisfaction. It seems simply a vocal effort, and as such is unique, but, unfortunately for the donkey, it is unappreciated. The connection between a donkey’s voice and his tail is obscure, but undoubted. It is impossible for him to do justice to himself unless his tail be elevated, and advantage has been taken of this peculiarity by man, who is apt at turning the weaknesses of others to his own benefit. It has been found that by attaching a weight to a donkey’s tail—a brick is sufficient—neither the tail nor the voice can be elevated. In this respect it must be owned that the donkey is easier to deal with than a woman; for while the former can be effectually reduced to silence, no means have hitherto been discovered for suppressing ladies with a mistaken estimate of their vocal abilities.

Happily of late there has been some slight reaction in favour of the donkey, and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has done something towards impressing upon the minds of the class of men who chiefly utilise the services of the ass that the animal is not altogether insensible to pain, that he needs a certain amount of sustenance, and that there is a limit to his draught powers. Why a mistaken idea upon these points should have so long prevailed is by no means clear. That it has prevailed is evident from the fact that a certain class of men brutally misuse donkeys, as they misuse no other creatures save their wives. Men do not take an absolute pleasure in beating dogs; but no one can doubt that the brute who lays a heavy stick across an unoffending donkey does feel a malicious joy in the pain he gives. Matters are better than they were; the schoolmaster is abroad, and so are the policeman and the officer of the Society, and between them some slight alleviation of the lot of the ass is in progress. But even now the spectacle of five or six hulking louts seated behind a staggering little donkey, and urging him on his way with oaths and blows, may be witnessed any Sunday or Bank Holiday afternoon, upon every road leading through the suburbs into the country, to the disgrace alike of our civilisation and humanity. In Egypt and in the East the donkey still holds something of his former position in public esteem, and even a portly merchant, or a grave functionary, has no idea that he is in any way demeaning himself when, perched upon the top of an enormous saddle, placed on the back of a donkey, he proceeds about his business. Had the capacities of the ass been equally recognised in the West, the cycle would never have obtained such a height of popularity as it has done. A well-made cycle will cost almost as many pounds as a donkey will cost shillings. Its expenses of repair will equal in cost the keep of the donkey, and, except as a means of promoting perspiration and keeping down flesh, no human being would compare the easy and gentle amble of the donkey with the labour required for a cycle as an instrument of progression. It is a pity that among the many good works that have been effected by the influence of Royalty that of raising the donkey in public esteem has hitherto had no place. The appearance of the Princess of Wales in the Park, in a light equipage drawn by two handsome donkeys, would in a short time produce a moral revolution, and the good little beasts would soon resume their proper place in popular favour.

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THE DRAGON.

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LIKE the dodo, the moa, and the great auk, the dragon is admittedly an extinct animal, but that is no reason why his characteristics should not be considered in these pages. The question that has long agitated scientific men is, first, as to the extent to which the personal peculiarities of the dragon have been exaggerated by popular tradition, and in the second place as to the period at which he became extinct. There have been those who have even asserted that his existence was purely apocryphal, but with men so mentally constituted argument is useless. The traditions of almost all nations point to the fact that not only did the dragon exist as a race, but that individual dragons continued to exist down to comparatively modern times. We may set aside at once the dragon of Wantley. Cæsar makes no allusion to dragons existing in Great Britain; Wantley did not exist before Cæsar’s time; therefore there can have been no dragon at Wantley. But it is not possible so summarily to dispose of all legends, and it is remarkable that the dragon should figure with almost precisely the same characteristics in the folk lore of both Western and Oriental peoples. Our most valuable national coin bears its portrait, and it is the national emblem both of China and Japan. St. George, as we know, was a warlike saint of Cappadocia; although his feats and adventures are somewhat doubtful and misty as to locality, it may be assumed that the dragon who succumbed to his prowess was a native of Asia.