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These crocodiles of Batabano appeared to us to be specifically identical with the Crocodilus acutus. It is true that the accounts we heard of their habits did not quite agree with what we had ourselves observed on the Orinoco; but carnivorous reptiles of the same species are milder and more timid, or fiercer and more courageous, in the same river, according to the nature of the localities.

The Crocodilus acutus of San Domingo, in which I cannot hitherto specifically distinguish the crocodiles of the great rivers of the Orinoco and the Magdalena, has, according to Cuvier, so great a resemblance to the crocodile of the Nile,* that it required a minute examination to prove that the rule laid down by Buffon relative to the distribution of species between the tropical regions of the two continents was correct.

A true crocodile, also, Crocodilus toliapicus, and another saurian more nearly allied to the gavial, accompany the above fossils; also the relics of several birds and quadrupeds. One of these last belongs to the new genus Hyracotherium of Owen, of the hog tribe, allied to Chaeropotamus, another is a Lophiodon; a third a pachyderm called Coryphodon eocaenus by Owen, larger than any existing tapir.

While speaking of crocodiles, I should observe that the family of huge saurians, to which the monsters belong, is divided into three genera: Alligator is peculiar to America; Crocodilus is common both to the Old and New World; while a third, Gavialis, is found in the Ganges and other rivers on the continent of India.