154 SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF MAMMALIA. 



into the oesophagus through a small orifice surrounded 

 by a muscle of circular fibres, allowing only the gradual 

 transmission of food which has been previously reduced 

 to a thorough pulp. This structural peculiarity was first 

 pointed out in the capybara by Mr. Morgan (' Linn. 

 Trans.' vol. xvi.), but we meet with it also in the coypu, 

 the capromys, and the beaver. (See ' Proc. Zool. Soc.,' 

 1832, p. 73 ; 1835, p. 175.) In the capybara the head 

 is large, the muzzle thick and blunt, the upper lip deeply 

 fissured ; the eyes are moderately large ; the ears small 

 and rounded. The naked patch of the size of half a 

 crown occupies the cheek a little below each eye. The 

 fore-limbs are short and muscular, the toes being four, 

 furnished with strong claws ; the hind-limbs are also 

 thick, but longer than those before, and the whole of 

 the sole, which is covered with naked rough skin, is 

 applied to the ground. The toes are three in number, 

 having strong large hoof-like nails, and being partially 

 connected together by intervening membranes. The 

 tail, a mere rudiment, is scarcely to be perceived. This 

 animal exceeds three feet six inches in length, and its 

 body, which is more than three feet in girth, owing to its 

 bulk and the shortness of the limbs, almost touches the 

 ground. It is covered with long, coarse, thinly-set hairs 

 of a sandy or brownish gray. (Fig. 98.) A fine speci- 

 men, recently living, is preserved in the Museum of the 

 Zoological Society. 



The capybara is a gregarious animal, frequenting the 

 rich and wooded borders of the lakes and rivers in Brazil, 

 Guiana, and Paraguay. Mr. Darwin states that it is 

 common, wherever there are large rivers or lakes, over 

 that part of the South American continent which lies 

 between the Orinoco and the Plata, a distance of 

 nearly 1400 miles. They are not generally supposed to 

 extend south of the Plata, but he heard that there were 

 capybaras (provincially termed Laguna carpincho) high 

 up the Salado, and presumes that they have sometimes 

 been seen south of the former river. This animal lives 

 usually in small companies, which remain concealed 

 among the thickets and dense herbage of the borders of 



