Chap. III. RESULT OF THE IPI HUNT. 45 



the whole country for many miles round, and had, at 

 any rate, the melancholy satisfaction of feeling that 

 I was hardening myself for any amount of endurance 

 that might be required in my future explorations. 

 At length, on the 5th of March, I was rewarded 

 by finding two specimens, an adult female and a 

 young one ; the skins and skeletons of both I pre- 

 served and afterwards sent to the British Museum. 

 The adult measured about four feet and a half from 

 the head to the tip of the tail. The flesh of the ipi 

 is good eating. Those that I captured were very 

 lean, but I was informed by the natives that they 

 are sometimes very fat. I found, on dissection, no- 

 thing but the remains of ants in their stomachs. The 

 tail is very thick, and makes a large track on the 

 ground in walking. 



On my return to England I found, as I had 

 expected, that my ipi was a new species ; but it 

 appears that, some time after the arrival of my 

 two specimens, another was bought from a dealer, 

 who said that it had come from Dr. Baikie, having 

 been found by him in the neighbourhood of the 

 River Niger. It has been described by Dr. Gray 

 in the ' Proceedings of the Zoological Society,' April, 

 1865, under the name of Pholidoius Africanus, so 

 that it belongs to a different genus from the rest 

 of the African species of these curious animals, 

 which are ranged under Manis. It is interesting 

 to find that the animal is more nearly allied to an 

 Indian form than to the other African pangolins. 

 My adult skeleton fortunately turned out a fine and 

 perfect specimen, the largest yet known, and it may 



