[Enclosure]

M^r Ward informs me that there are people in the Seychelle islands who remember to have seen them alive in that group though he has failed hitherto to get any bones.²

I prefer however giving you chapter & verse when I can do so, and I therefore enclose you an extract from the journal of the Bishop of Mauritius, giving an account of his visit to Mahé in March 1864; which he has since publish for private circulation.³

You will see the name of his informant is given and the mode in which one of the last crocodiles was caught described, with the additional statement that the father of the narrator had killed no less than 110 (wild?) animals. The nature of its food is also disclosed in this extract.

You enquire what the Madagascar crocodile eats— I presume fish & small aquatic reptiles, but there are plenty of marvelous stories of its pulling down men. It abounds in the Lagoons which are parallel with the sea between Tamatave and Andevorande⁴

Transport to the Seychelles in a trunk of a tree is certainly possible but it appears to me highly improbable. The crocodile does not venture out to sea burrows in the mud instead of crawling over fallen timber, and could hardly live the requisite time without food and water as it was used to. Assuming however it was so transported it would be from the African not the Indian side, if we are to take the double cocoa Nuts as an indication that the set of the currents is from Seychelles to the Malaba coast.⁵

Besides the distance from Madagascar is far shorter and the Amirantes form a stage, though I never heard of crocodiles there. I suppose a skeleton would settle this point, though I do not at present know what the specific differences between the African and Indian crocodile are.

“But what struck me more than the account of the Sharks, was that given by several persons and especially by M^r. Calais of the crocodiles, which within the memory of many persons now living, infested the Seychelles— M^r. Calais’ father killed 110 himself, and the last of them M^r. Calais distinctly remembered. It was in the large “mare” (pond or lake) close to the house where we slept at Baie Lazare. A “Caiman” or crocodile was reported, the bait was placed, a little pig rather tainted, which an old Negro took and replaced by a bit of fish. In the morning the apparatus had sunk; the crocodile was drawn out and killed and was found to be full of eggs. It was 18 feet long.”

Extracts from the Journal of the Bishop of Mauritius

visit to Seychelles March 1864⁶

Mons Calais is described as a Proprieter residing now at Ile aux Cerfs in the harbour of Mahé⁷

The length of this crocodile is the extreme attributed to the Indian crocodile (crocodilus bifurcatus) in Ceylon by Sir Emerson Tennent⁸   That of Madagascar (crocodilus vulgaris Cuvier var D— Pollen’s Animaux Vertébrés de l’ile de Madagascar)⁹ is said to be even larger & that it is quite as formidable will be seen by the following extract from the latest account of the Island.

“A day or two after we had passed the Plain of Mangoro M^rs. Lambert followed bringing amongst other presents to the King an Arab horse. Whilst crossing one of the small marshy streams the greatest depth of which could not exeed 4 feet, the Horse was attacked on his left flank by a huge crocodile (the marks of whose teeth were shown me after the Horse arrived at the capital

The groom jumped off on the side farthest from the crocodile, who was repulsed by a kick in its jaws from the wounded horse— Disgusted with this reception, the crocodile next attacked a Malagasy slave, who was leading a donkey, dragged him under the water and destroyed him”

Madagascar & the Malagasy

by Lieut Oliver R.A.

Day & Son 1864¹⁰