PROTEUS. 277 



sluggish waters of vast subterranean lakes, whence 

 many rivers take their origin. In these dreary 

 reservoirs, over which a gleam of light has never 

 played, save when the torch of the inquisitive 

 traveller is flashed back from the unruffled sur- 

 face, are found many Protei, swimming through 

 the waters, or burrowing in the mud which is 

 precipitated by them. 



Nearly all that is known of these strange 

 tenants of the bowels of the earth is comprised 

 in the following extract from Sir Humphrey 

 Davy's " Consolations in Travel," where the 

 appearance of the Protei is graphically described. 

 In a conversation supposed to take place in the 

 magnificent cavern above-named, Euhathes, one 

 of the speakers, says, " I see three or four crea- 

 tures, like slender fish, moving on the mud below 

 the water." 



" The Unknown. — * I see them ; they are the 

 Protei ; now I have them in my fishing-net, and 

 now they are safe in the pitcher of water. At 

 first view, you might suppose this animal to be 

 a lizard, but it has the motions of a fish. Its 

 head and the lower part of its body and its tail 

 bear a strong resemblance to those "of the eel ; 

 but it has no fins, and its curious branchial 

 organs are not like the gills of fishes ; they 

 form a singular vascular structure, as you see, 

 almost like a crest, round the throat, which may 

 be removed without occasioning the death of the 

 animal, which is likewise furnished with lungs. 

 With this double apparatus for supplying air 

 to the blood, it can live either below or above 

 the surface of the water. Its fore feet resemble 

 hands, but they have only three claws or fingers, 



