QUEER PHASES OF ANIMAL LIFE, 



599 



eras ; and our Mammoth Cave, with its countless grottoes, has only 

 two bat-uolcs, whose occupants have never been known to change 

 their quarters. 



,.-! '< 



Fig. 5. Children of Erebus. 



Nearly all the South Asiatic vegetarians treat mischievous ani- 

 mals with a more than Christian forbearance ; but the worshipers of 

 Brahma have, besides, been taught to regard certain species of the 

 brute Creation as half divine, and consequently altogether inviolate, 

 and entitled to the active charity of every true believer the most 

 privileged of the zoological demi-gods being the bhunder-baboon 

 {Papio Rhesus), the Honuman (Semnopithecus entellus), the Brahmin 

 cow, the pigeon, and the common crocodile. In Hindostan the public 

 spirit of wealthy philanthropists rarely rises above the orthodox con- 

 servatism of the national mind ; bequests are not devoted to public 

 improvements, but rather to the maintenance in statu quo of incor- 



