FURRY ANIMALS I75 



made the acquaintance of a fawn (Fig. 76), 

 probably a different kind of deer, which was so 

 tame that it licked my hand for the salt on it. 



After Alston 



Fig. 77. Tapir 



My greatest disappointment was in not finding 

 a tapir. We found tracks on different parts of the 

 island, but never did we see one. The natives 

 were afraid of these big animals, w^hich they called 

 "mountain cows," and I should not be surprised 

 to find they had led me astray once when we 

 thought, from fresh tracks, that one must be near. 



The tapirs (Fig. 77) are relatives of horses and 

 rhinoceroses. They are found in Central and 

 South America and across the world on the Malay 

 Peninsula. They are supposed to have lived first 

 in Asia and to have made their way across Siberia 

 into Alaska and down into America, in the days 

 when all the world was much warmer and it was 

 comfortable traveling where now are ice and 



