The adult alligator is easily taken prisoner by being seized from behind as it lies basking; its legs are securely bound, its mouth muzzled, and then--away to a showman’s cage! The Orinoco cayman and the Mississippi alligator are often captured in the following curious fashion. A hook baited with some small animal, which the alligator especially likes as food, is dropped into the water, and when seized by the alligator, the hook which is not sharp, but blunt and double, is arranged to expand and fill the creature’s throat, but will not pierce or tear it. Then by pulling at the chain or rope attached to this hook, the brute is drawn ashore. A strong man next leaps on its back, grasps its fore-legs and draws them bridle-wise back to serve as reins. Thus mounted the captor maintains his seat as on a fractious horse, during all the creature’s plunges and tail-lashing, until finally it succumbs, fairly worn out by its own battle. Once entirely exhausted, it becomes weak, mild, and obedient. The food of the alligator is squirrels, rabbits, water-rats, water-fowl, fish, hares, and young dogs, but it will attack men and kill children if it has opportunity. Its method of preying is much like that of the Nile crocodile; the victim is first pulled under the water and drowned, and then eaten at leisure.[73] The alligator seems to know that while he is merely enjoying a little agreeable change under the surface of the water, his prey will drown. Why does not the water rush into the lungs of the alligator, and so smother it, as the alligator is a lung-breathing animal? Because it has at the base of its tongue an interior collar which expands and guards the passages to the lungs when it is under water. When it wants a mouthful of air it elevates its head above water while its hands hold its victim below the surface. The alligator is a smaller animal than the crocodile, its length being from five to ten feet; its head is shorter and broader than that of the crocodile, and its snout is more obtuse. The large, long teeth on the lower jaw do not, as in the crocodile, fit into external furrows on the upper jaw, but into pits made there to receive them. The hind legs and feet of a crocodile have a jagged fringe which the alligator does not have; the alligator’s hind feet are webbed only about half way up the toes, and the crocodile’s hind feet are webbed to the very tip. Despite the strong musky odor of the alligator’s flesh, it has sometimes been eaten: so also there are people who will eat crocodile’s flesh and eggs. To a civilized appetite no flesh could be more loathsome.