Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1910-12-01
IN FIGHT FOR LIFE
MANS THRILLING ESCAPE FROM
JAWS OF CROCODILE.
Story of an Old Sailors Determination
to Bag His Game After Being
Injured in Encounter With
Monster.

1t is only a few months since the
incidents happened that 1 am about
to relate, writes A Cavendish In
Chambers Journal Ny work took me
on visit up a river to one of those
underwriting camps where are felled
and RATED the great hardwood logs so
valued in the Chinese market.
G., the white man in charge, was a
characteristic old hard case," who
had started life before the mast in a
sailing ship and drifted in a beach
combfng fashion to our colony, where
he had been given, almost in charity!
subordinate billet in one of the large
timber companies. Arriving in my
boat at the little jetty or landing
stage, l was astonished to find G. ly-
ing on rattan couch within a few
yards of the bank with a heavy ex7
press rifle across his knees gazing in
tently at rough pagan or fence erect
ed in the stream.
Hanging from this fence and a few
feet above the water were the corpsesl
Of monkey and several pariah dogs;
while half a dozen ducks, each tied
to the fence by the leg with a long
string, tapped about on the water and
Quacked dismally in their efforts to
escape. was just wondering wheth-
er the whisky bottle or too much soli-
tude accounted for this state of af-,
fairs, when 1 noticed that G.'s leg was
swathed in rough bandages from knee
to ankle.
Throwing myself down near him in
the welcome shade l learned the fol-
lowing story: Two nights before G..
was sleeping peacefully in his little
palm leaf house in a clearing about
20 yards from the river bank when his
dog began to growI and refused to be
silenced. G. turned out and walked
around the hut to ascertain the cause
OF the disturbance, but seeing nothing
addressed himself to the dog in his
usual lurid and picturesque sailing
ship language and retired to bed
again. Five minutes later he was
once more aroused by a yelp from the
dog, and this time really annoyed he
seized stick and sailed forth to in.
fict dire punishment on the disturber
of his dreams. Suddenly a dark form
glided swiftly from the shadows and
G. felt himself seized by the right
knee as in vice.
STOPPING to free himself, he found
he was in the grip of a large croco
die whose teeth were firmly imbed.
ded in flesh and bone. Backward and
forward the struggle swayed, the
crocodile striving to pull its destined
victim to the waters edge and G.
hampered as he was by his impris
oned leg, fighting for his life to reach
higher ground. At last the beast, hurI
ing its victim to the ground with q
shake cf its powerful head, began ia
drag him swiftly toward the water
Poor g., feeling, as he expressed it
that it vas "all over bar the shoutin',H
determined to make one last effort
for his life, and taking advantage OF
a momentary halt as the brute was
steering past a tree stump, he sat up
and succeeded in getting both his
thumbs into the reptiles eye sockets,
the only vulnerable part of a croco
dies head.
AC 1851 VI LuS olOIy 1S p6IudUI
best told in G.'s own words, or as
nearly as circumstances (and the edi
tori will permit: $50 soon as l gets
me thumbs made fast in is eyes a
opens is mouth to shout and lets go
my leg. Then first thing next mornln'
the coolies lays s breakfast for m.
as you see, an gets into this chair.
an ere 1 stays If it's month" Vain
ly tried to persuade G. to come away
with me to the next station and see
a doctor. He refused to move from
that chair until he had bagged his
crocodile.
met him again a week later in a
hospital bed suffering severely, but
quite happy in the knowledge that the
bones of that crocodile were bleaching
in the sun outside his house. Poor old
c.! Only few weeks afterward the
habit of clearing creepers from his
path In the jungle with the butt end
Of his loaded and cooked rife proved
fatal to him.