of this reptile:  the shell is one inch and a half thick, and as impenetrable as steel.  It lies in holes in the bottom of muddy rivers or in the swampy cane-brakes, and measures often ten feet in length and six in breadth over the shell, independent of the head and tail, which must give often to this dreadful monster the length of twenty feet.  Such an unwieldy mass is not, of course, capable of any rapid motion; but in the swamps I mention they are very numerous, and the unfortunate man or beast going astray, and leaving for a moment the small patches of solid ground, formed by the thicker clusters of the canes, must of a necessity come within the reach of one of these powerful creature’s jaws, always extended and ready for prey.

Cawanas of a large size have never been taken alive, though often, in draining the lagoons, shells have been found measuring twelve feet in length.  The planters of Upper Western Louisiana have often fished to procure them for scientific acquaintances, but, although they take hundreds of the smaller ones, they could never succeed to drag on shore any of the large ones after they have been hooked, as these monsters bury their claws, head, and tail so deep in the mud, that no power short of steam can make them relinquish their hold.

Some officers of the United States army and land surveyors, sent on the Red River by the government at Washington for a month, took up their residence at Captain Finn’s.  One day, when the conversation had fallen upon the cawana, it was resolved that a trial should be made to ascertain the strength of the animal.  A heavy iron hand-pike was transformed by a blacksmith into a large hook, which was fixed to an iron chain belonging to the anchor of a small-boat, and as that extraordinary fishing-tackle was not of a sufficient length, they added to it a hawser, forty fathoms in length and of the size of a woman’s wrist.  The hook was baited with a lamb a few days old, and thrown into a deep hole ten yards from the shore, where Captain Finn knew that one of the monsters was located; the extremity of the hawser was made fast to an old cotton-tree.

Late in the evening of the second day, and as the rain poured down in torrents, a negro slave ran to the house to announce that the bait had been taken, and every one rushed to the river side.  They saw that, in fact, the hawser was in a state of tension, but the weather being too bad to do anything that evening, they put it off till the next morning.

A stout horse was procured, who soon dragged the hawser from the water till the chain became visible, but all further attempts of the animal were in vain; after the most strenuous exertion, the horse could not conquer the resistance or gain a single inch.  The visitors were puzzled, and Finn then ordered one of the negroes to bring a couple of powerful oxen, yoked to a gill, employed to drag out the stumps of old trees.  For many minutes the oxen were lashed and goaded in vain; every yarn of the hawser was strained to the utmost, till, at last, the two brutes, uniting all their strength in one vigorous and final pull, it was dragged from the water, but the monster had escaped.  The hook had straightened, and to its barb were attached pieces of thick bones and cartilages, which must have belonged to the palate of the monster.