twelve yards of where the brute lay, and aiming about an inch
behind the eye, drove a bullet clean into his brain. He gave a
convulsive kind of shudder and lash with his tail, and was, I believe,
dead; but to make certain I gave him the second barrel at about four
yards' distance behind the shoulder, and then felt quite confident that
I had indeed "wound him up."

It was some time before we could induce the natives to assist in pulling
him on dry land. Though they do not mind them living and swimming about,
they are particularly careful of a wounded one, a single sweep of its
powerful tail, even when mortally stricken, being known to break both
legs of a man like a pipe-stem. Though dead enough to all intents and
purposes, an alligator, like either a shark or a turtle, will continue
possessed of a certain amount of vitality and motion for a long period
after life is really extinct. This fellow was still gently swaying his
tail about while we bent on a rope to it, and, all five of us clapping
on, soon hauled him to the dry mud on the bank, where we took his
length, opened his jaws, and generally examined the formidable-looking
reptile at our leisure. He was about fifteen feet long and inconceivably
hideous. The first bullet had smashed a large hole exactly where I
aimed,--namely, about one inch behind the eye; the skull seemed
comparatively thin there, was unprotected by any thick skin, and a large
lump of his brain was oozing through the wound. The second bullet went
through his heart; but I am convinced that it was unnecessary, as the
first shot had done all that was needful.

Much as people have written to the contrary, I am quite satisfied now
that an alligator is as easily slain as a rabbit, if only hit in the
right place; and that place is not in the eye, as is generally stated,
but on the same level, and from an inch to an inch and a half behind it.
The brain in all reptiles lies rather far back in the head, joining
almost to the neck. By striking one in the eye from many positions it is
quite possible that the brain may not be touched at all; while, if the
ball hits the slightest degree in front of it, on the creature's long
ugly snout, the bullet might as well be chucked in the river for all
the harm it will do the alligator. Unsightly as these gentry are, the
Indians occasionally eat them. The skins are sometimes tanned; but
they smell so strong, it is an awkward job to handle them. During dry
seasons they col