Crocodiles of the largest size frequent many of the streams and most of the lakes in the Philippines. They are also to be seen occasionally on sandbars rising out of the sea. Doubtless they will some day be shot for their hides, but as yet they are left undisturbed, unless they display special proclivities for eating human beings, valuable horses or fat cattle. The Filipinos claim that with crocodiles the liking for human flesh is an acquired taste, and that it is only in comparatively rare instances that they become man-eaters, as do tigers. I believe that this is true. Certainly, I have seen a clear pool full of happy Tagbanua children with a big crocodile lying in plain sight at the bottom of it. On the other hand, I have known of individual crocodiles, of evil reputation, each of which have killed numbers of human beings. In one little pool crossed by a trail which I have had occasion frequently to use in Cagayan province ten persons were pulled down and devoured in three years. Most men who use the rifle sooner or later become interested in putting these vicious reptiles out of the way whenever opportunity offers. Hunters and fishermen, in search of new and exciting experiences, will not fail to meet with them in the Philippines, and the tourist will find there much that is picturesque, strange or wonderful. CHAPTER XXX PHILIPPINE LANDS Especial interest attaches to the subject of Philippine lands for three reasons: first, the very large majority of small landholders in the islands have no titles; second, there are enormous areas of unoccupied, unclaimed, uncultivated land which are doing no one any good at present and ought to be brought under cultivation as rapidly as possible; third, not only insular government officials, but Mr. Root and Mr. Taft have been very unjustly attacked for the land policy pursued in the Philippines. As regards ownership, some 31,879 square miles may be considered to be private land to which owners have obtained titles or could have done so had they known how to assert their rights. Only about 8937 square miles of this total amount are estimated to be under cultivation at the present time. Excepting only private lands and a few acres belonging to municipal or provincial governments or to the insular government as the case may be, the remaining land constitutes the public domain of the Philippine Islands which is the property of the government of the United States, but is administered by the insular government. It is made up of forest land, mineral land, agricultural land, and foreshore and land under water. Fifty-four thousand square miles are estimated to be forest land. The rest is now provisionally classified as agricultural land for the reason that the mineral land and foreshore have never been segregated.