pearance. The tongue is remarkable for its great length 

 and power of muscular contraction. The lips are also long 

 and flexible, and thus the giraffe, like the elephant, is sup- 

 plied with an admirable organ for the examination and pre- 

 hension of its food. 



Giraffes are so strikingly colored— large blotches of a 

 darker or lighter chestnut brown on a paler ground— that 

 one would expect to find them conspicuous figures in their 

 own haunts. Schillings, however, remarks that the giraffes 

 and also zebras and leopards, • likewise strikingly marked, 

 really find a special protection in their coloring. "It harmo- 

 nises so perfectly with their surroundings that they are 

 blended in the back ground, so to speak, and can easily be 

 overlooked." 



Giraffes dv/ell chiefly on the plains, though at certain sea- 

 sons of the year, usually at the beginning of a dry period, 

 they may take refuge in the mountain v/oods. They are 

 gregarious and are usually found in small herds of twenty 

 or so individuals. They are most abundant in these days, 

 since their destruction in South Africa, on the plains of Ger- 

 man East Africa, v/here they find all the conditions in life 

 necessary to thern. 



Their food consists chiefly of the foliage of the several 

 species of acacia trees, which are abundant in this district, 

 and for brov/sing on which, their long, free lips and pre- 

 hensile tongue are especially adapted. It is only in captiv- 

 ity, when a sufficient supply of their natural food is not at 

 hand, that they become reduced to the necessity of such 

 provender as grafts, hay and clover. The long neck is m.ani- 

 festiy unsulted to browsing from the ground, though the 

 awkv/ard feat can be accomplished by dint of much strad- 

 dling. Water is not an essential accompaniment to the food, 

 for the giraffe can do without it for days at a time. During 

 the rainy season the moist leaves afford a sufficient supply. 



Increasing evidence seems to shov/ that the girafi'e is very 

 truly a dumb animal. The low, bleating sound occasionally 



L3 



