Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/356

 332 ALLIER ALLIGATOR some religions controversial essays, and has contributed articles to the "North American Review," the "Evangelical Quarterly Re view," and other periodicals ; and he has privately printed and circulated a number of tracts. ALLIER, a central department of France, part of the old province of Bourbonnais, bounded by Nievre, Sa6ne-et-Loire, Puy-de-dome, Creuse, and Cher; area, 2,822 sq. m. ; pop. in 1872, 390,812. It takes its name from the river Al- lier, which flows through its centre ; the Cher, like the Allier a southern affluent of the Loire, flows through the western part of the depart- ment, and the Loire waters its eastern border. The surface is undulating, and the soil generally fertile, yielding much grain and wine. Coal and minerals of various kinds abound; and there are celebrated mineral springs. The de- partment is divided into the arrondissements of Moulins, La Palisse, Gannat, and Montlucon. Capital, Moulins. ALLIGATOR (Fr. alligator, It. alligatore, corrupted from the Sp. el lagarto, the liz- ard), a largo carnivorous, amphibious rep- tile, of the saurian family, peculiar to Amer- ica. The name was first given to this ani- mal by the English colonists of the southern Alligator. portion of what are now the United States, but has been gradually extended to all the va- rieties of the family, called caymans, crocodiles, jacar6s, &c., by the Spaniards, Portuguese, and Indians of the southern continent. The alliga- tor was formerly believed to be identical with the crocodile of the old world ; but there have subsequently been found to exist distinctions which indicate generic differences. The ge- neric characteristics of the family are long flat heads, thick necks and bodies, protected by regular transverse rows of long plates or shields, elevated in the centre into keel-shaped ridges, and disposed on the back of the neck into groups of different forms and numbers, according to the species. The month is ex- tremely large, extending considerably behind the eyes, and furnished in each jaw with a sin- gle row of conical teeth, all of different sizes, and standing fur apart from one another. The eyes are placed on the upper surface of the skull, very near to each other, and provided with three eyelids. The feet have five toes before, long and separate; four behind, more or less perfectly connected by membranes ; the interior toes only, on all the feet, being provid- ed with claws. The tail is of great length, slender, strongly compressed at the sides, and surmounted toward its origin by a double series of keel-shaped plates, forming two upright den- ticulated crests, which, gradually converging toward the middle of the tail, there unite and form a single row to the extremity. The tail is the animal's great instrument of progression in the water, and its great weapon of defence when surprised on land. Both genera, alliga- tors and crocodiles, hibernate, taking no food during the winter months ; the Nilotic croco- diles, according to Pliny, withdrawing into caves and .holes in the banks, while the alli- gators of America bury themselves in the mud of stagnant rivers. The principal food of both alligators and crocodiles is fish, but they watch for and devour land animals and even men. It is alleged that the musky fluid secreted from the glands of the throat acts as a sort of bait, and attracts the fish on which they prey. The alligators, according to Cuvier, have the head less oblong than the crocodiles. Its length is to its breadth, measured at the ar- ticulation of the jaws, as three to two; the teeth are unequal in length and size ; there are at least 19, sometimes even as many as 22, on each side*in the lower, and 19 or 20 in the upper jaw. The front teeth of the under jaw pierce through the upper at a certain age ; and the fourth from the front, which are the largest of all, enter into corresponding holes of the up- per jaw, in which they are concealed when the mouth is closed. The hind legs and feet are round, and neither fringed nor pectinated on the sides ; the toes are not completely webbed, the connecting membrane only extending to their middle ; and finally, the post-orbital holes of the cranium, so conspicuous in the croco- diles, are very minute in the alligators, or even entirely wanting. Further than this, it is ob- servable that the alligators, unlike the croco- diles, are rarely if ever to be found in running streams, preferring stagnant ponds and the creeks of large rivers, in which, particularly in South America, they may be seen in great numbers, protruding their large flat heads through the leaves of the nymphsea, pontederia, and other aquatic plants, and watching for their prey ; or sometimes basking in the sun, or sleeping on the banks. They rarely come on shore, except during the hottest part of the day, and always retire to the water on the ap- proach of night, during which they are ex- tremely active in search of their food. They generally lay from 50 to 60 eggs in one place, of about the same size as those of the goose, which they cover up with sand, and leave to be hatched by the heat of the sun, never, how- ever, removing to any great distance. When the young ones come forth, they are five or six inches long, and are immediately conducted to the water by the female alligator. Seldom more than half the brood long survive, the re-