24 Prof. BuckrAND on the Adaptation of the Structure 
gular animal,” he observes, “is destined to be produced, to live and to die on 
trees; he inhabits remote and gloomy forests: from the descriptions which 
have been given of the Sloth, you would suspect that no naturalist had gone 
into the wilds to examine his haunts, and see whether Nature has committed 
any blunder in the formation of this extraordinary creature. As the Indians 
and negroes are the people who usually catch the Sloth and bring it to the 
white man, it is probable the erroneoust ecounts we have hitherto had of the 
Sloth have arisen from examining the animal in those places where Nature 
never intended he should be exhibited. 
* Some years ago I kept a Sloth for several months: I often took him out of 
the house and placed him on the ground in order to have an opportunity of 
observing his motions; if the ground were rough, he would pull himself for- 
wards, by means of his fore-legs, at a pretty good pace; and he invariably 
shaped his course towards the nearest tree; but if I put him upon a smooth 
and well-trodden part of the road, he appeared to be in trouble and distress : 
his favourite abode was the back of a chair; and often getting all Iis legs in a 
line upon the topmost part of it, he would hang there for hours together. The 
Sloth in its wild state spends its whole life upon trees, not upon the branches, 
but under them; he moves suspended from the branch, he rests suspended 
from it, and he sleeps suspended from it; hence his seemingly bungled confor- 
mation is at once accounted for. One day, crossing the Essequibo, I saw a 
large two-toed Sloth on the ground upon the bank; though the trees were not 
twenty yards from him, he could not make his way through the sand time 
enough to make his escape before we landed: he threw himself on his back, 
and defended himself with his fore-legs: I took a long stick and held it for him 
to hook on, and then conveyed him to a high and stately mora; he ascended 
with wonderful rapidity, and in about a minute he was almost at the top of the 
tree; he now went off in a side direction, and caught hold of the branch of a 
neighbouring tree; he then proceeded towards the heart of the forest."—For 
more full details of his very interesting account of the Sloth tribe, I must refer 
my readers to Waterton's Wanderings, pp. 161, 284. 
I am indebted to my friend Mr. Burchell for the following account of his 
personal observations on the habits of the Sloth during his late travels in South 
America. At Santos in Brazil, in 1826, Mr. Burchell kept a tame Sloth, a 
