292 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



slightly to one side or below, and ahead again for 

 another scrape. I was able to analyze these 

 successive movements, but in reality they followed 

 one another with the swiftness and ease, the pre- 

 cision and correlation, of a man's steps. 



The mouth was strongly protuberant, the jaws 

 being wholly beyond the normal curve of the fore- 

 head, nostril and chin. The lips were soft and 

 attached so far back that they could be drawn out 

 of the way of any other part of the face or mouth. 

 The teeth were perfectly adapted to their work — 

 remarkable little scraping machines which cleaned 

 the growths from the rocks as a hoe cuts the weeds 

 from sod. They were the strangest-looking teeth 

 in the world and at first glance recalled a double 

 row of the tiny ivory hands on long sticks which the 

 Japanese carve so exquisitely. Under the care- 

 ful scrutiny of a lens, another absurd, and this 

 time a perfect, simile forced itself upon me. There 

 were nine on each side, both above and below, 

 thirty-six in all, and to the smallest curve they were 

 not like hands, but feet — thirty-six little soles, with 

 five, well-graduated toes on the tip of each, a grace- 

 ful in-curving arch, and a delicate heel. The teeth 

 were inserted at a strong outward angle, and over- 

 lapped on each side so that the functioning top of 

 each tooth was limited to the great, and to the next 

 two toes. For a time it was difficult to be abstractly 

 dentistic in my contemplation, and not laugh at 

 the thought which the eye compelled, of eighteen 

 little men just disappearing down the throat of 

 every Xesurus. The rounded tips were evidently 



