s waters; and Mr. H. T.
Colebrooke informed me, that he had seen both forms in places far
inland, many hundred miles from the sea. The Gangetic crocodile, or
Gavial (in correct orthography, Garial), is confined to the fresh water,
living exclusively on fish, but the commoner kinds, called Koomiah and
Muggar, frequent both fresh and salt, being much larger and fiercer in
salt and brackish water.[371] These animals swarm in the brackish water
along the line of sand-banks, where the advance of the delta is most
rapid. Hundreds of them are seen together in the creeks of the delta,
or basking in the sun on the shoals without. They will attack men and
cattle, destroying the natives when bathing, and tame and wild animals
which come to drink. "I have not unfrequently," says Mr. Colebrooke,
"been witness to the horrid spectacle of a floating corpse seized by a
crocodile with such avidity, that he half emerged above the water with
his prey in his mouth." The geologist will not fail to observe how
peculiarly the habits and distribution of these saurians expose them to
become imbedded in the horizontal strata of fine mud, which are annually
deposited over many hundred square miles in the Bay of Bengal. The
inhabitants of the land, which happen to be drowned or thrown into the
water, are usually devoured by these voracious reptiles; but we may
suppose the remains of the saurians themselves to be continually
entombed in the new formations. The number, also, of bodies of the
poorer class of Hindoos thrown annually into the Ganges is so great,
that some of their bones or skeletons can hardly fail to be occasionally
enveloped in fluviatile mud.

It sometimes happens, at the season when the periodical flood is at its
height, that a strong gale of wind, conspiring with a high spring-tide,
checks the descending current of the river, and gives rise to most
destructive inundations. From this cause, in 1763, the waters at
Luckipour rose six feet above their ordinary level, and the inhabitants
of a considerable district, with their houses and cattle, were totally
swept away.

The population of all oceanic deltas are particularly exposed to suffer
by such catastrophes, recurring at considerable intervals of time; and
we may safely assume that such tragical events have happened again and
again since the Gangetic delta was inhabited by man. If human experience
and forethought cannot always guard against these calamities, still less
can the inf