28 STUDIES, SCIENTIFIC AND SOCIAL chap. 



garpike, and the mud-fish, belonging to the extremely 

 ancient type of the ganoids, the huge devil-fish of South 

 Carolina, one of the most gigantic of the rays ; with many 

 others. Among its shells, the fresh-water Unioda? are 

 prominent ; and, in the insect collection, the number of 

 large and brilliantly-coloured butterflies is very striking 

 as compared with those of Europe. 



The next room takes us into South America, and here 

 we are at once struck with many remarkable contrasts. 

 First, there is the comparative scarcity of large mammalia, 

 the higher groups being represented by the llama, the 

 tapir, a few small deer, and the jaguar, which is common 

 to North America ; while such low and ancient types as 

 the sloths, ant-eaters, and armadillos abound, together 

 with an unusual number and variety of large rodents, and 

 many peculiar forms of monkeys. Some of these are shown 

 in the accompanying illustration (Fig. 3) from a photograph 

 taken in a corner of this room. The extinct mammals 

 are well represented by a fine skeleton of the Megatherium 

 or giant sloth of the Pampas. The birds exhibit a won- 

 derful richness and variety, with a similar preponderance 

 of low types of organization. The blue and claret- coloured 

 chatterers, the many-coloured little manikins, the strange 

 white bell-birds, the wonderfully-crested umbrella-bird of 

 the Upper Amazonian islands, the brilliant crested cock- 

 of-the-rock, and the innumerable tyrants, bush-shrikes, 

 and ant-thrushes, all belong to a type of perching birds 

 in which the peculiar singing-muscles of the larynx have 

 not been developed, and which are but scantily represented 

 in any other part of the world. The metallic trogons, 

 with yellow or rosy breasts; the ungainly but finely- 

 coloured toucans, with their huge but exquisitely-tinted 

 bills ; the green and gold jacamars ; as well as the hun- 

 dreds of species of those winged gems, the humming-birds, 

 represent a yet lower and more archaic type of bird life 

 nowhere so strongly developed as in this marvellous con- 

 tinent. The beautiful crested curassows are also a low 

 form perhaps allied to the Australian mound-makers. 

 Reptile life is abundantly represented, but except, per- 

 haps, the iguanas, there are none to strike the ordinary 



