Evening star., 1926-10-03
Perous Search Made for Rare Birds in Trinidad Sea

to Hoy1e / should have done. Some
devilish little imp kept whispering In
my ear: Shoot him In the eye.
Shoot him in the eye" and against
all precedents and sense, mechant-
cally / obeyed.
My vicious little bullet put out his
optic, knocked a piece out OF his bonv
eyebrow, and went whizzing Off over
the saw-grass toward Miami
THE big crock was knocked crazy.
First. six feet of an enormous
tail shot up out of the water. then
disappeared, TO be followed by SIX
feet of dragon head and shoulders.
With the boat we wildly followed him
up, and landed seven bullets in the
back of his neck. Finally we chased
him into shallow water. where he
grounded, and obligingly died of old
agei
With half foot Of his tail gone, he
measured II feet inches, and his
bulk was enormous. We hitched our
boat to him. and foolishlv tried to tow
him by his own floatage; but. pshaw.
We could as easily have towed a two
ton safe.
No; we did not spoil the skin. nor
under our own steam, and the stuffed
giant has reposed on a polished
pedestal in the United States National
Museum ever since.
My lucky strike in Florida precipi-
tated other troubles with crocodiles I'm
other lands. The next important mix
up occurred in Venezuela. on the
Orinoco, in the dry season. close be
low Ciudad Bolivar.
BY good rights I should have been
swallowed alive. or carried into The
stream and drowned; and would have
been but for the kind Providence that
watches over the destinies OF fools
and drunken men.
Again Chester r.. Jackson and I
were hunting together. and. having
ambushed a very ugly and vicious
sharp-nosed crocodile l2 feet long. We
fred together. Our bullets landed
only two inches apart. The old crock
lay still on the sand and sprung his
Jaws wide apart. thereby registering
a mortal hit.
F'oolishly leaving my rifle lying
where l fired It, I sprinted at top
speed across a hundred yards of clean
sand, to- grab the crock by the tail
before he could drag himself into the
water and get lost.
AS I stopped and seized the end Of
his tail. mighty sweep of that MEM
ber threw me aside. and in just two
ticks of the clock that awful brute
whtrled as If on a pivot. and pre-
sented his long snout and four long
rows of teeth within a handkerchief
Of my face. He opened his jaws
about three feet wide (so II seemed 20
me) and gave a cultural snarl of
rage that scared me horribly.
Chester yelled, LOOK out" and ran
forward. Like a frightened goat
sprang to the tail end of the horrid
reptile, and again he whirled and
faced me. Then he snapped his Jaws
together with a loud "clank," so
near me I could have touched him:
and such awful eyes I never saw be.
fore or since.
BY the time we had executed that
semi-circle for third time Chester
rushed up with his loaded rife, put
. shot into my eMerny's neck. and
finished his career
Now, just why that reptile did not
take to the water and plunge out of
sight, as he was due 10 do, I do not
, know; and just why he did not make
one good lunge forward for me ana
grab me I'm his jaws. do not know
Perhaps 1t was because he knew that
the Museum of Comparative Zoology
needed his skin, and would immortal
lie him; but even If that were true
he had no right TO scare me to death.
as he did.
fCopyrl7ht 1927