PRIMEVAL MAN 251 



itseK fearlessly assail man or dog. When 

 chased by hounds, in the open, I have seen one 

 instantly throw itself on its back, in which 

 position it was much more dangerous to the 

 hounds than they were to it. Doubtless if at- 

 tacked by a jaguar — and we killed jaguars in 

 the immediate neighborhood — it would, if 

 given a moment's warning, have defended it- 

 self in the same fashion. I suppose that this 

 defense would be successful; for otherwise it 

 seems incredible that such a conspicuous, slow- 

 moving beast can exist at all in exactly the 

 places where jaguars, able to kill a cow or 

 horse, are plentiful. But, even so, it is difficult 

 to understand how it has been able to persist 

 for ages in company with the great spotted 

 cat, the tyrant of the Brazilian wilderness. 

 At any rate, with this example before us, we 

 need not wonder overmuch at the ability of 

 megatherium and mylodon to hold their own 

 in the presence of the sabretooth. 



In the late fall of 1913, as previously de- 

 cribed, I motored north from the beautiful 

 Andean lake, Nahuel Huapi, through the stony 

 Patagonian plains to the Rio Negro. The only 

 wild things of any size that we saw were the 

 rheas, or South American ostriches, and a 

 couple of guanacos, or wild llamas, small, swift. 



