PACHYDERM ATA. 163 



advantageously used as a beast of burden. The sight, hearing 

 and smell of this animal are very acute. It is in much request 

 by the natives for its flesh, which, though coarse and dry, they 

 deem excellent food. The skin is also valuable, from its tough- 

 ness and density. 



T. Midayanus, (or T. Indians.) The MALAY or ASIATIC TAPIR is 

 larger than the American, which it resembles in form and gen- 

 eral habits. Its back and sides are of a grayish white, abruptly 

 edging the brown of the other parts, which gives the animal an 

 appearance as if a white horse-cloth had been spread over it; 

 the neck is destitute of a mane. Its flesh is eaten by the natives 

 of Sumatra. In captivity, like the South American animal, it is 

 gentle and inoffensive, " becoming as tame and familiar as a dog, 

 feeding indiscriminately on all kinds of vegetables, and some- 

 times fond of attending at table to receive bread, cakes, or the 

 like." The young, as is the case with the American species, 

 differs in color from the adult, being, at the age of four or five 

 months, black, beautifully marked with spots and stripes of a 

 fawn color above, and white below. 



A third spscies has been discovered in the Cordilleras of South 

 America, covered with thick black hair, and with a more elonga- 

 ted trunk. 



Hyrax, (Gr. %, hurax, froravc, Tins, a swine.) The animals 

 of this genus are small, and aptly described in the Holy Scriptures, 

 as " a feeble folk," but of great interest on account of the pecul- 

 iarity of their organization. " They are rhinoceroses in minia- 

 ture." Cuvier, by a recourse to the anatomy of the Hyrax, 

 proved it to be a true Pachyderm; and "notwithstanding the 

 smallness of its proportions," intermediate between the Rhinoce- 

 ros and the Tapir. This animal has twenty-one ribs on each 

 side, a number greater than that possessed by any other quadru- 

 ped, the Unau excepted, which has twenty-three. Its molar 

 teeth resemble those of the Rhinoceros, as it does also in the 

 characters of its stomach and alimentary canal. The body is 

 covered with thick hair, and "beset here and there with erinace- 

 ous bristles." It has a simple tubercle in lieu of a tail ; four 

 toes on each fore foot, and three on the hind ones. 



H. Syriacus. The DAMAN of Syria, the CONEY of the Bible, is 

 of a brownish gray color above, and has the lower parts white; 

 these two colors being separated by a yellowish tint, and the head 

 and feet being more gray than the body. The skin, where it is 

 exposed, is of a blackish violet. The length is about two feet ; the 

 height eleven inches. It stands rather low on the legs, being par- 

 tially plantigrade ; its body is stout for its size, which is hardly equal 



