TARANTULA. 



783 



more varied in the colour. They are represented as 

 being beautifully mottled with black, white, brown 

 and fawn-colour ; the stripes and spots of fawn being 

 upon the upper part of the body, and the white ones 

 toward the under part. The colour changes when it 

 is about half a year old. 



It appears that, though a recent addition to our 

 zoological catalogues, it is far from rare in many parts 

 of the Malay country, both in the islands and peninsula. 

 The tribes of different parts, both of the coast coun- 

 try and the interior, have different names for it, which 

 is one pretty strong proof of its being a native animal 

 in them all. It is probable that Europeans resorting 

 to these islands have been aware of its existence for 

 a long time ; but that a double mistake was com- 

 mitted respecting it. It was considered as a hippo- 

 potamus, and thus that animal, of which there is no 

 living instance but in Africa, was transferred to the 

 Malay/eountry ; and it was confidently said, that 

 there was no species of tapir but the American one. 

 The researches conducted by Sir Stamford Raffles, 

 and also by the French naturalists Diard and Douce- 

 ville, brought to light many of the singular produc- 

 tions of those interesting countries, and make us wish, 

 for the sake of natural science, as well as for the arts 

 and the advantage of those places themselves, that 

 they had continued a little longer. 



The full-grown ones in those parts of the country 

 which are most favourable for them are large animals, 

 as much as eight feet in total length, and more than 

 six feet in the circumference of the body. But as 

 they are animals of concealment during the day, and 

 also of retired places ; and as, under the former system 

 of treating the natives of these countries, it was by 

 no means safe to make excursions to any distance 

 from the fort or factory, there were not the means, 

 even if there had been the desire, of knowing much 

 about the natural history. 



A living specimen, which Sir Stamford Raffles sent 

 from Bencoolen to Bengal, while it was yet young, 

 showed the same inoffensive disposition as the Ame- 

 rican one. It was taken to Barrackpore, where a 

 collection of animals is or used to be kept ; and it 

 went about quite at its ease, being fond of the water, 

 and often entering into the ponds and tanks, in which, 

 contrary to what is stated of the American one, it 

 walked on the bottom under the water, and showed 

 little or no disposition to swim. The length of the 

 movable snout fits it for a habit of this kind, as it 

 can breathe at a much greater depth than a short- 

 nosed animal ; and the structure of its feet, and the 

 whole air of its body, are much more aquatic than 

 those of the American. Of its breeding time, or the 

 period of its gestation, or indeed of any of its habits in 

 its native haunts, we know little or nothing. It seems 

 to be a law among the pachydermata, and it is rather 

 a curious one, that those genera which have many 

 mammae on the belly in the females, and numerous 

 litters at a time, are also animals of very short gesta- 

 tion ; while those which have but two mammae in the 

 groin, and produce but one or rarely two at a birth, 

 have the period of gestation much longer. This 

 makes them doubtless inferior to the others in produc- 

 tiveness ; but there is a compensation in nature, the 

 animals are in themselves much more hardy and long 

 lived ; and their own strength, and the places which 

 they inhabit, conspire in making them much more 

 secure from enemies. In a state of nature the two 

 may be found at no very great distance from each 

 other, but they are never exactly on the same kind of 



ground ; and as generally inhabiting every part of the 

 world, they evidently belong to very different states of 

 it. The tapirs belong to those with only two mammae, 

 and they occupy nearly the same kind of ground ; 

 and hence we may conclude, that the countries where 

 they are now found only in the fossil state were very 

 different in their physical state from what they are 

 now. 



Two fossil tapirs have been mentioned, one as oc- 

 curring in France, and the other in North America. 

 Of the remains of the French one, there can be no 

 doubt; but the American is much more questionable. 



The French one is the gigantic tapir ( T. gigantcus), 

 and it well merits the name ; for the bones show that 

 it is well entitled to the epithet, as they indicate a 

 size and strength not inferior to those of the rhino- 

 ceros, or even of the elephant itself. Their horns 

 are found in the alluvial deposits, at least judging 

 from the teeth, which are almost the only bones that 

 have been found ; but such is the perfection to which 

 comparative anatomy has been brought, that the size 

 and the leading characters of an animal may be tole- 

 rably made out from a single bone. 



The supposed American species is a much smaller 

 animal, though larger than the bony tapir of that 

 continent. It has been called T. mastodontoides, 

 from the resemblance of its remains to those of the 

 mastodons, especially those of the large one, which 

 are found in the same places of North America; and 

 it is highly probable that they have not belonged to 

 a tapir at all, but to a mastodon, which resembles the 

 elephant more in all those characters that can be 

 made out ; so that Europe is in the mean time the 

 only part of the world in which we can distinctly say 

 there are the fossil bones of a tapir. 



TARANTULA, or TARENTULA, the ordi- 

 nary name 'given to many large species of spiders, 

 including those of the genus Mi/gale, but more strictly 

 applied to a species of Lycosa, found in the south of 

 Italy, and especially in the neighbourhood of Taren- 

 tum in that country, whence it has obtained its ordinary 

 name, and which has become famous not only on 

 account of the supposed venomous effects of its bite, 

 which are stated to have been followed by death or 

 tarentismus, but also from the supposition that music 

 and dancing were the only remedies against this 

 insect's bite. The Tarantula belongs to the division 

 of the cunicular or mining LI/COSCE, which inhabit sub- 

 terraneous intrenchments, which they construct for 

 themselves. The most elaborate account which we 

 possess of this spider is given by M. Dufour in the 

 Annales des Sciences Naturelles for 1835, and which 

 has been translated in the new series of the Magazine 

 of Natural History. M. Dufour had studied its 

 habits in different parts of Spain, and is convinced 

 that the species which he investigated is the true 

 Tarantula of the ancients, of all authors who have 

 written upon tarentismus, and of Baglivi, Linnaeus, 

 Fabricius, &c. It is on the upper side of the body 

 of a grey colour, varying to blackish or clay-co- 

 loured, with a paler margin to the body ; the cephala- 

 thorax more or less clouded ; the mandibles black, 

 with the base in front greyish ; the back of the ab- 

 domen with two or three somewhat arrow-headed 

 marks and transverse posterior fascia of black ; 

 beneath it is black ; the belly velvety-black, with the 

 margins and anus broadly ochraceous ; the trochan- 

 ters and base of the femora and tibiae having two 

 black spots. It varies in its length from ten to four- 

 teen lines. . 



