Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1893-08-17
THE cRocoprLE-BIRD.
It Enters the Mouth OF the Saurfan and
Removes Leeches-

THE cRocoDILE-BIRD.
It Enters the Mouth OF the Saurfan and
Removes Leeches.
The Ibis contains an extremely IN
teresting communication by Mr.. j. NJ
Cook on the subject of the old world
story of the bird which is said to attend
on the crocodile, and to enter its mouth
for the purpose of either picking its
teeth or removing the leeches from its
mouth. The latter is the older YER
sion, and was told by HerodotuS as fol-
lows: s.An other birds and beasts
avoid him 1.-THE crocodile); but he is at
peace with the trochilos because he re-
ceives benefit from that bird For
when the crocodile gets ont of the
water on land and then opens its jaws
which it does commonly toward the
west, the trochilos enters its mouth
and swallows the leeches; the crocodile
is so well pleased with this service that
1t never hurts the trochilos-" Number
less authors have repeated the story
which was amplified and oddly dis
torted by Pliny and the medieval au-
thors who followed him-but among
modern ornithologists, at all events, it
has received but little credence, though
it is mentioned by many of them
Their position in the matter is well eN-
emplifed by Gould in his Birds
of ASIA where, though in the
background of his plate repre-
senting the Egyptian plover. he
shows two of these birds entering the
mouth of crocodile, and in his letter
press he discusses the question whether
this bird or the spur-winged plover is
the trochilos of Herodotus- He tells US
that he only inserted the figure OF the
crocodile to illustrate an oft-told tale,
and that the point as to which bird was
intended is of little moment,since in all
probability the story is not founded on
truth.
Mr.. Cook has, however, thrown new
light on the question, and has supplied
us with direct evidence that bird.
which he identifies as the spur-winged
plover, does enter the crocodile's
mouth. 1t appears that in the year
1876 he noticed some crocodiles and
| several of the birds (which are called
| by all the natives of the Nile valley
crocodile-birds.' on q very large sand
| bank near Derr, the capital of Lower
Nubia, and with his brother-in-law,
| the late Mr.. J. E. Hedges. determined
| to watch them The following is his
account. in a somewhat condensed
form, of what happened: For this
! purpose, during the dark hours, we
had a small pit dug on the western
side of the large Sandbank in question,
| and about the peep of day the follow
| ing morning we esconced ourselves in
! the pit We watched patient
! " until about noon, when two large
crocodiles came out of the water on to
the bank, and apparently were soon
menced fitting over them, and through
| our field-glasses we watched one bird
and saw it deliberately go up to a croc-
/ odile, apparently asleep, which opened
its jaws
''The bird hoped in, and the croco-
| die closed its jaws In what appeared
| to be a very short time, probably not
| more than a minute or two, the croco-
die opened its jaws, and we saw the
| crocodile-bird go down to the waters
edge. As the sandbank was, should
| say, at least half a mile across, and the
| birds back was turned towards US, we
| could not see whether 1t vonited in the
water or drank; but in the course of a
| few seconds it returned to the croco-
! die. which opened its mouth again,
| and the bird again entered The mouth
| was closed, and in a short time was
opened again for the bird to come out,
and the same operation was repeated
at the river bank We saw the same
bird enter the crocodile's mouth three
! times, and on three occasions run to
| the water to either vomit or drink. -
| Eventually Mr.. Cook shot two of the
birds, which, as we have said, he has
since identified as the spur-winged
| plover. In conclusion, he tells us that
'.he never knew that the fact of the
crocodile-bird entering the crocodile's
mouth was seriously doubted" until a
| conversation which he had recently
with DIR. Sclater and Mr.. Seebohm.-
| London Saturday Review.