1832-3.] THE TUCUTUCO. 37 



the meat is very indifferent. On the islands in the Rio Parana they 

 are exceedingly abundant, and afford the ordinary prey to the Jaguar. 



The Tucutuco (Ctenomys Brasiliensis) is a curious small animal, 

 which may be briefly described as a Gnawer, with the habits of a mole. 

 It is extremely numerous in some parts of the country, but is difficult 

 to be procured, and never, I believe, comes out of the ground. It 

 throws up at the mouth of its burrows hillocks of earth like those of 

 the mole but smaller. Considerable tracts of country are so completely 

 undermined by these animals, that horses in passing over, sink above 

 their fetlocks. The tucutucos appear, to a certain degree, to be grega- 

 rious: the man who procured the specimens for me had caught six 

 together, and he said this was a common occurrence. They ara 

 nocturnal in their habits ; and their principal food is the roots of plants, 

 which are the object of their extensive and superficial burrows. This 

 animal is universally known by a very peculiar noise which it makes 

 when beneath the ground. A person the first time he hears it, is much 

 surprised ; for it is not easy to tell whence it comes, nor is it possible 

 to guess what kind of creature utters it. The noise consists in a short, 

 but not rough, nasal grunt, which is monotonously repeated about four 

 times in quick succession : * the name Tucutuco is given in imitation 

 of the sound. Where this animal is abundant, it may be heard at 

 all times of the day, and sometimes directly beneath one's feet. When 

 kept in a room, the tucutucos move both slowly and clumsily, which 

 appears owing to the outward action of their hind legs ; and they are 

 quite incapable, from the socket of the thigh-bone not having a certain 

 ligament, of jumping even the smallest vertical height. They are very 

 stupid in making any attempt to escape ; when angry or frightened 

 they uttered the tucu-tuco. Of those I kept alive several, even the 

 first day, became quite tame, not attempting to bite or to run away ; 

 others were a little wilder. 



The man who caught them asserted that very many are invariably 

 found blind. A specimen which I preserved in spirits was in this state; 

 Mr. Reid considers it to be the effect of inflammation in the nictitating 

 membrane. When the animal was alive I placed my finger within half 

 an inch of its head, and not the slightest notice was taken : it made its 

 way, however, about the room nearly as well as the others. Con- 

 sidering the strictly subterranean habits of the tucutuco, the blindness, 

 though so common, cannot be a very serious evil ; yet it appears strange 

 that any animal should possess an organ frequently subject to be 

 injured. Lamarck would have been delighted with this fact, had he 

 known it, when speculating f (probably with more truth than usual 



* At the R. Negro, in Northern Patagonia, there is an animal of the same 

 habits, and probably a closely allied species, but which I never saw. Its 

 noise is different from that of the Maldonado kind ; it is repeated only twice 

 instead of three or four times, and is more distinct and sonorous : when 

 heard from a distance it so closely resembles the sound made in cutting 

 down a small tree with an axe, that I have sometimes remained in doub t 

 concerning it. 



f Philosophy Zoolog.,iom. L, p. 242. 



