MOVABLE ARMOUR 



lizard. They clash with a vast series of important facts 

 which differentiate mammals from animals lying lower 

 in the series, which have been already enumerated, and, 

 quite apart from the fact that they differ in many details 

 from the carapace of the tortoise or turtle, no more 

 affinethetwo than does the beak of the tortoise, or the 

 Ornithorhynchus, bridge over the gulf between those 

 creatures and the bird. The huge, and we may almost 

 say, " therefore," extinct, Glyptodons, which were allies 

 of the armadillos, were boxed up in their carapaces ; 

 the modern armadillos enjoy a freedom of movement 

 within theirs, since the bony pieces are often distributed 

 in bands. A species often to be seen at the Zoo, and 

 known as Tolypeutes tricinctus, has its chest protected, 

 as ought his to be who first crosses the seas, by a triple 

 band, not of brass, but of bone. In others again there 

 are six bands ; and the tiny Chlamydophorus (which will 

 probably not be seen at the Zoc) has a point of likeness 

 to the effete Glyptodonts, in having a rigid box envelop- 

 ing it without jointing. So thoroughly movable are 

 these bands as a rule, that the armadillo can roll up into 

 a ball like its namesake, the armadillo woodlouse, and 

 thus be with impunity played at ball with by a hungry 

 jaguar, intent rather on solid food than playful trifling. 

 Nor could the jaguar easily solve the difficulty by swal- 

 lowing the armadillo like a pill. In its own choice of 

 food the armadillo is decidedly a carrion lover, and ap- 

 proaches its food after the devious fashion of a burying 

 beetle. Instead of openly making for the carcass, the 

 armadillo circuitously tunnels underground and comes 

 up underneath it. We are told that on the pampas a 

 carcass is rarely found that has not beneath it a tunnel 

 formed by some epicurean armadillo intent on luxury. 

 At the Zoo this taste is severely restricted, and a diet of 

 pap and chopped meat offered in its place. Mr. Hudson 

 relates another way the armadillo has of providing itself 



134 



