NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUTH AFRICA 



Although they, at times, ascend trees when the 

 trunks are sufficiently sloping, the mungooses are 

 terrestrial by habit. I have frequently seen them 

 spring from the ground on to low branches and run 

 along them in the most active and confident manner, 

 seeking for birds' nests, tree lizards, and caterpillars. 

 The claws of the mungoose are not sharp, and the 

 pads of the feet are not provided with any powers 

 of suction as is the case with the Tree Dassie (Pro- 

 cavia arborea) ; therefore they are unable to climb 

 perpendicular trunks of trees. 



A great deal has been written about the combats 

 of mungooses with venomous snakes, and the im- 

 munity of these animals to the venom of snakes. 

 I had occasion to experiment upon certain of the 

 South African species with snake venom, and found 

 that they were not immune, as generally supposed. 

 However, like most of the cat-tribe of animals, 

 they are very tenacious of life, and the venom always 

 took much longer to kill them than was the case 

 with most other animals of the same size. For 

 instance, a rabbit twice the size of a mungoose 

 (Mungos pulverulentus) after the subcutaneous in- 

 jection of Cape Cobra venom died in fifteen minutes. 

 The mungoose, on the contrary, after the injection 

 of a similar dose showed symptoms of poisoning, 

 but recovered. The mistake which most experi- 

 menters fall into is that they gauge the dosage of 

 venom according to the weight of the animal, 

 under the supposition that it produces certain 



