1 85 



THE HUNTER'S ARCADIA. 



hogs are quite as dangerous as those of India, being 

 equal in speed, activity, and courage. The reason 

 it has not been made a practice by Europeans in 

 Africa to ride down and spear these animals, doubt- 

 less is, that they are seldom found in galloping ground; 

 and, further, when they are hard pressed, they go to 

 earth. To see these beasts do this last perform- 

 ance is wonderful. The brute, when pursued, rushes 

 to its burrow, on reaching v/hich, without an appa- 

 rent halt, it turns round, as if on a pivot, and 

 backs into the ground. I believe, and have been 

 told, that unless it did this, it would be unable to 

 turn round to come out again, on account of its 

 rotundity of figure ; and as the holes they take 

 shelter in are apparently small for the purpose to 

 which they are devoted, the above supposition has 

 evidently good grounds for being accepted as correct. 



The burrows occupied by the vlakke-vark are not 

 of their own construction, but made by the ant-eater 

 originally, though probably enlarged by the new tenant, 

 for in these earths the sows produce their young, 

 rear them, and ultimately remain there domiciled, until 

 the family gets broken up by the course of events. 



On account of the hardness of the surface of the 



