Curiosities of natural history. Second series

[227] While thinking about alligators and crocodiles, a letter was put into my hands from my cousin, CharlesBuckland, Esq, who holds a high and responsible situation in the Civil Service of India. When he went out, I requested him to record for me all remarkable facts in natural history (and he is no bad observer) which came under his notice. He writes to me as follows :— “ It chances that I am now at Burdwan, where there is a native rajah who keeps a really good menagerie. He has two rhinoceroses, who live in a large walled enclosure, in the centre of which is a reservoir of water, and five crocodiles live in this lake.
Addendum [354] Since the publication of the first edition, I have received this note from my cousin :— '
“Sad to say, one rhinoceros died, and the survivor did not afford sufficient cover to poor piggy, and the alligators ran him down and ate him;