466 Mr. Morgan on the Anatomy 



guishing characters are more strongly marked than in most 

 other species of the rodent animals. 



The stomach is formed by a single membranous bag (Tab. 

 XXVII. Fig. l.),and as in the case of other mammiferous vege- 

 table feeders, in which we find this simple form of stomach, it 

 will be seen by reference to the plate (Tab. XXVII. Fig. 2.) that 

 the caecum is large and complicated in proportion. 



Having met with nothing requiring particular notice in the 

 remaining part of the alimentary canal, I proceeded to examine 

 more particularly the structure of the mouth and throat. The 

 grinding surfaces of the molar teeth are of very considerable 

 extent, as will be seen in Tab. XXVIII. ; and it must be obvious 

 how necessary such an arrangement of parts must be to the 

 health of the animal, when we consider the nature of its food, and 

 the simple structure and limited functions of its most important 

 digestive organ, a provision being thus made for the proper 

 mastication of the hard vegetable substances upon which the 

 animal must occasionally subsist. I found however, upon further 

 examination, that there was another structure hitherto unde- 

 scribed, by which the process of perfect mastication is rendered 

 indispensable to the passage of food from the mouth to the 

 stomach. The structure to which I allude, and by which the 

 possibility of swallowing any portion of unmasticated nutriment 

 is prevented, was shown in an extraordinary formation of the 

 velum palati mollis, or soft palate : this membrane, which in 

 other animals generally forms an imperfect floating septum, 

 suspended from the back part of the roof of the palate, and 

 interposed between the cavity of the mouth and pharynx, I 

 found in the Capybara (and in some of its congeners) to be 

 much more extensive in its attachments and diflerent in its form 

 and uses. 



On separating the jaws and examining the fauces, the mouth 



appears 



