1832-3.] THE CAPYBARA OR V/ATER-IIOG. 49 



tlie riflo. My powder being- exliausted, I was obliged to get up 

 (to w.y siiame as a sportsman be it spoken, though well able to 

 kill birds on the ^^■ing) and halloo till the deer ran awav. 



The i^iost cm ions fact witli respect to this animal, is the over- 

 powerinaly strong and offensive odour which jiroceeds from the 

 buck. It is quite indescribable: several times whilst skinning 

 the specimen which is now mounted at the Zoological Museum, 

 I was almost overcome by nausea. I tied up the skin in a silk 

 pocket-handkerchief, and so carried it home : this handkerchief, 

 after being well washed, I contiimally used, and it was of course 

 as repeatedly washed ; yet every time, for a space of one year 

 and seven montiis, when first unfolded, I distinctly perceived 

 the odour. This appears an astonishing- instance of the perma- 

 nence of some matter, which nevertheless in its nature nHK>t be 

 most subtile and volatile. Frequently, when passing at the 

 distr.nce of half a mile to leeward of a herd, I have perceived 

 the whole air tainted with the effluvium. I believe the smell 

 from the buck is most powerful at the period when its horns are 

 perfect, or free from the hairy skin. When in this state the 

 meat is, of course, quite uneatable; but the Gauchos assert, that 

 if buried for some time in fresh earth, the taint is removed. I 

 have somewhere read that the islanders in the north of Scotland 

 treat the rank carcasses of the fsh-eating birds in the same 

 manner. 



The order Kodentia is here very numerous in species : of 

 mice alone I obtained no less than eight kinds.* The largest 

 gnawing animal in the world, the Plydrochaerus capybara (the 

 water-hog), is here also common. One which I shot at Monte 

 Video weighed ninety-eight pounds: its length, from the end of 

 the snout to the stump-like tail, was tnree feet two inches ; and 

 its girth three feet eight. These great Rodents occasionally 

 frequent the islands in the mouth of the Plata, where the 

 water is quite salt, but are far more abundant on the borders 



* In South America I collected altogether twenty-seven species of mice, 

 .ind tliirteen more are known frum the works of Azara and other authors. 

 Tliose collected by myself have been named and described by Mr. Water- 

 house at the meetings of the Zoological Society. I must be allowed to take 

 this opportunity of returning my cordial thanks to Mr. Waterhouse, and to 

 the other gentlemen attached to that Society, for their kind and most liberal 

 Jissistance on ail occasions. 



