236 NAtUkAL HISTORY ESSAYS 



organised mammals. They feed particularly on 

 termites and sugar-ants, and also turn various other 

 insects out of the ground by rooting with their 

 blunt snouts. Fallen trees are carefully inspected 

 and the rotten wood torn away for the sake of 

 the beetles concealed within ; ant-hills are wrecked 

 and most minutely worked through, the echidna 

 methodically grubbing for hours amid the ruins, 

 and sweeping up the luckless ants with its six-inch 

 tongue. A remarkable circumstance doubtless 

 assists the echidna in retaining its insect prey : for 

 both tongue and palate are beset with minute spines 

 recalling those which the writer in 1902 observed 

 on the palate of the lesser bird of Paradise^ These 

 anteaters also explore the roots of saplings with their 

 claws ; doubtless little in the insect line comes amiss 

 to such practical entomologists. It is difficult to 

 account for the presence of the sand which, as in the 

 white whale, occurs in the stomach. Perhaps, how- 

 ever, small particles swept in with the ants 

 accumulate in the echidna's interior ; yet if such be 

 the case one would certainly expect the very 

 peristaltic action of the stomach itself to effectually 

 remove in a few hours at most all trace of such 

 involuntary ballast. One wonders whether the 

 echidna intentionally swallows the sand, just as 

 insect-eating and other birds peck at gravel to aid 



1 Renshaw ; " The Lesser Bird of Paradise" — AvicnlUiral Maqazinc, 

 1903. ^ 



