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288 REPTILES AND REPTILE CHARMS CHAP.
clumps of fempiei (or dempiei} trees just above
high-water mark, using the fallen leaves to form the
nest, and breaking up the twigs with her mouth. The
season for laying is said, in the north of the Peninsula,
to coincide with the time "when the rice-stalks swell
with the grain," i.e. the end of the wet season.
The most prolific species of crocodile is reputed
to be the buaya lubok, or Bight crocodile (also called
buaya rawang, or Marsh crocodile), which lays as
many as fifty or sixty eggs in a single nest. Other
varieties, I may add, are the buaya tembaga (Copper
crocodile), the buaya katak (Dwarf crocodile), which
is, as its name implies, "short and stout," and the
buaya hitam or besi (Black or Iron crocodile),
which is
reported to attain a larger size than any other variety.
This latter kind is often moss-grown, and is hence
called buaya berlumut (Mossy crocodile). The largest
specimen of this variety of which I have had any
reliable account is one which measured " four fathoms,
less one hasta" (about 23 feet), and which was caught
in the time of Sultan Mahmat at Sungei Sembilang,
near Kuala Selangor, by one Nakhoda Kutib.
The buaya jolong-jolong, which has attracted
attention owing to its reputed identification with the
gavial of Indian waters, and which is therefore no
true crocodile, is pointedly described by Malays as
separating itself from the other species.
Finally, there is the buaya gulong tenun (the
" Crocodile that Rolls up the Weft "
?), which is not,
however, the name of a separate variety, but is the
name applied to the Young Person or New Woman of
the world of crocodile-folk the aggressive female who
" snaps " at everything and everybody for the mere
glory of the snap !
'