W2s 



NATURAL HISTORY. 



tangled thickets of rattan and other spiny plants. Even this is not satis- 

 factory : for the female, who must seek her food in the same way, does not 

 possess them. I should be inclined to believe, rather, that these tusks 

 were once useful, and were then worn down as fast as they grew; but that 

 changed conditions of life have rendered them unnecessary, and they now 

 develop into a monstrous form, just as the incisors of a beaver or a rabbit 

 will go (»n growing if the opposite teeth do not wear them away." 



The only American pigs are the little, but by no means insignificant, 

 peccaries of Central and South America, one of the species ranging north 



■ yv<£ 



Fig. 497. — Peccaries (Dicotyles torquatits). 



as far as Arkansas. Unlike the wild boars, they form large herds which 

 roam through the forests in their search for food. They are most coura- 

 geous little beasts, or possibly it is better to say that they do not know 

 enough to be afraid. When one of the herd is injured, the rest do not 

 run away, but seek to kill the offender; and many a tale is told of human 

 beings falling victims to the rage of these little animals, about three feet 

 long ami a fool and a quarter in height. Everything is afraid of them: 

 even the puma and the jaguar, those lords of the forests, make way for a 

 drove of these implacable little beasts. Their flesh is utterly useless as 

 food, as it is thoroughly impregnated with the secretion of a gland opening 

 on the rump, and which is described as being nearly or quite as offensive 

 as that of the skunk. 



