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It seems strange, however, that they made no attempt to kill some of the myriads of birds and monkeys in the trees, or the edible snakes which swarm in the grass, or, as a last resource, the alligators in the river. Gaunt with hunger, they took the trail again after a night of misery at Torna Munni.
"Over, and lighten her. Shove her into midstream, and we'll row it out." "Alligators!" Little whispered, much as he might have said "Skittles." "Damn the alligators!" retorted Barry, and set the example by leaping into the turbid river. Little struck the water almost with the same splash, and the boat's crew started to clamber over the sides, shamed into obedience.
But farther yet to the northeast, in the Florida I best knew and loved, a whooping crane would startle the solitude with its uncanny cry, the alligators would croak their guttural grunts at waking time, while, here and there in the shadowy forest, the whine of a skulking panther would strike terror to the hearts of gentler things.
He had been showing me a little sketchbook full of Eastern jottings, and had just explained how a certain boat therein depicted had upset with him on a part of the Upper Nile so swarming with alligators that he had to swim for his life, and even so, barely scrambled up the slimy bank in time.
After about an hour's paddling, we reached a spot similar to the one where we had before taken shelter. We paddled along the shore of the little bay for some way, trying to find a place hard enough to bear our feet, for the bank was generally soft and muddy fringed by a broad belt of reeds, which the alligators must have found convenient for tickling their snouts with.
Sometimes a wounded steer would charge the canoa, and spill the huntsmen in the water, where the alligators nipped them. In the dry months, the hunters went on foot. When they killed a steer they cut the body into four, flung away the bones, and cut a big hole in each quarter.
"Well," she said flatly, "I shan't worry, I just shan't. I'm past that. There was a time, but at my time of life I just can't afford it. You can do as you please. You can go shoot alligators if you want to, Diane, I shan't interpose another objection. But the trials that I've endured in my life through the Westfalls, nobody knows. I was a cheerful, happy person until I knew the Westfalls.
See yonder hideous-faced creature, nearly six feet in length, the size of many alligators, its head covered with scaly plates, a huge dewlap depending from its throat, its body and long tail covered with small imbricated scales, its back garnished with a row of spines, and on its thigh a number of porous tubercles, while its legs and claws are wide-spreading.
The river and the lesser stream abound with alligators and hippopotami, the wild ducks and a variety of other aquatic birds resorting to them in considerable numbers.
The erection of the new house for the accommodation of the serpents, alligators, and other reptiles, which is shown in our illustration, must be commended as a valuable improvement of the Zoological Society's establishment in Regent's Park.
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