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Hence it is a
custom with some savages to spare crocodiles, or rather only to kill
them in obedience to the law of blood feud, that is, as a
retaliation for the slaughter of men by crocodiles. For example, the
Dyaks of Borneo will not kill a crocodile unless a crocodile has
first killed a man. "For why, say they, should they commit an act of
aggression, when he and his kindred can so easily repay them? But
should the alligator take a human life, revenge becomes a sacred
duty of the living relatives, who will trap the man-eater in the
spirit of an officer of justice pursuing a criminal. Others, even
then, hang back, reluctant to embroil themselves in a quarrel which
does not concern them. The man-eating alligator is supposed to be
pursued by a righteous Nemesis; and whenever one is caught they have
a profound conviction that it must be the guilty one, or his
accomplice."
Like the Dyaks, the natives of Madagascar never kill a crocodile
"except in retaliation for one of their friends who has been
destroyed by a crocodile.


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