Note 2 — Chapter XXV · Pampangos (2).

Their avocation is not destitute of danger, for these swamps are the home of the alligator.2 Although they are not as large as some I have seen in the River Paraguay or on the River Dáule, in Ecuador, they are quite large enough to seize a horse or a man. I was once visiting Fr. Enrique Garcia, the parish priest of Macabébe, when a native woman came in and presented him with a dollar to say a Mass in thanksgiving for the escape of her husband from death that morning. She told us that he was pushing a shrimp-net in shallow water when the buaya seized him by the shoulder. The fisherman, however, called upon his patron saint, and putting out his utmost strength, with the aid of Saint Peter, succeeded in extricating himself from the reptile’s jaws and in beating him off. His shoulder, however, was badly lacerated by the alligator’s teeth. It was lucky for him that he was in shallow water, for the alligator usually holds its prey under water and drowns it.