1402 THE EDENTATES 



parts. The short-tailed pangolin (M. temmincki) is readily distinguished by its 

 short and blunt tail, in which the under surface of the tip lacks the bare patch found 

 in all the other species except the next. The outer surfaces of the limbs are also 

 fully scaled. The giant pangolin ( M. gigantea] is sufficiently distinguished from the 

 last by its superior size. It is remarkable that the remains of a closely-allied species 

 have been found in a cavern in Madras. The whole of the four African species in- 

 habit the West Coast; but the short-tailed species also extends to South Africa and 

 ranges across the continent to Zanzibar and Southern Somaliland. 



The general habits of the African pangolins appear to be very simi- 

 lar to those of their Asiatic cousins. While, however, the 'long-tailed 

 and the white-bellied pangolins are partially arboreal, the other two are purely ter- 

 restrial. Most of the observations as to their habits have, however, been made 

 from captive specimens. In 1878, Mr. F. Holwood, in sending a young example of 

 the short-tailed pangolin to the L,ondon Zoological Gardens, wrote as follows to the 

 secretary. These pangolins " always appeared to burrow in hard or stony ground, 

 and I saw them always in the daytime. The mother of the specimen I sent you 

 lived three months in Zanzibar. She only fed at night, and remained curled up in 

 a ball all day. She regularly retired to the dark corner of my harness room at day- 

 light, and left for the garden at sunset. There were very few ants, but she seemed 

 to get plenty of insects. She burrowed at intervals all round the garden walls, but 

 this was evidently only trying to escape, as she never made a hole large enough to 

 give cover. ' ' Although the scales of this young pangolin were quite soft at birth, 

 they had completely hardened by the second day. Mr. I,. Fraser relates how his 

 pangolins would climb the somewhat roughly-hewn square posts, which supported a 

 building, and sometimes roll up into a ball and throw themselves down, apparently 

 without suffering any inconvenience from the fall. 



THE AARD-VARKS 

 Family ORTCTEROPODID^, 



The name aard-vark, or earth-pig, has been applied by the Dutch Boers of the 

 Cape to the southern representative of the second group of Old- World Edentates, of 

 which there are two living species exclusively confined to Africa. To the English 

 colonists of South Africa the Cape species is known as the ant-bear; while by the 

 zoologist the aard-varks are termed Orycteropus, and collectively constitute a very 

 distinct family group. In addition to the two living forms, the remains of an ex- 

 tinct species have been discovered in the Pliocene deposits of the island of Samos; 

 while those of another have been recorded from the Oligocene beds of France. 



In appearance both species of aard-vark are singularly ungraceful, not to say 

 ugly. Thus the body, which may be either almost naked or sparsely clad with 

 bristly hairs, is heavy and ungainly; the head greatly elongated, with a small tubu- 

 lar mouth, and somewhat pig-like snout; the ears of enormous length, and the tail 

 thick, cylindrical, and tapering, and nearly equal in length to the body. The neck 



