114 



Div. 1. VERTEBRATE ANIMALS— MAMMALIA. 



Class 1. 



The Ant-eaters {Myrmecophaga, Lin.) — 



Are well covered with hair, have a long muzzle which terminates by a small toothless mouth, from 

 ■which is protruded a filiform tongue, susceptible of considerable elongation, and which they insinuate 

 into ant-hills and the nests of the Termites, whence these insects are withdrawn by being entangled in 

 the viscid saliva that covers it. Their fore-nails, strong and trenchant, which vary in number according 

 to the species, enable them to tear open the nests of the Termites, and also furnish them with effective 

 means of defence. Wlien at rest, these nails are always half-bent inwards, resembling a callosity of the 

 tarsus ; hence these animals can only bring the side of the foot to the ground. Their stomach is 

 simple, and muscular towards its outlet, their intestinal canal moderate, and without a ccecum.* 



Tlie members of this genus are pecuhar to the warm and temperate regions of South America, and 

 produce but one young at a birth, which is carried on the back. 



^^^^ ^^_ ^^^^^ ^ _ The Maned or Great Ant-eater (M. jttbata, 



;<^(fflfl'i!^^^>fg^^^^^^ ^ X'^^^fc, ^ Auct.), upwards of four feet in length, with 



four anterior claws and five hind ones, and a 

 tail furnished with long- hairs vertically directed, 

 both above and beneath. Its colour is greyish- 

 brown, with an oblique black band bordered with 

 white on each shoulder. It is the largest species 

 of Ant-eater ; and stated [but erroneously] to de- 

 fend itself from the Jaguar. It inhabits low places, 

 never ascends trees, and moves slowly. 



The Tamandua (i1/. tamandua, Cuv. ; Myrm. 

 tetradactyla and M. tridactyla, Lin.). — Figure 

 and feet of the preceding, but not half the 

 Tig. 5i.-Great Ant-eater. gjje ; the tail scantily furnished with hair, and 



naked and prehensile at the tip, enabling the animal to suspend itself to the branches of trees. Some of them are 

 of a yellowish-grey, with an oblique band on the shoulder, that is only visible at a certain light ; others are fulvous 

 with a black band ; some fulvous, with the band, ci-upper, and belly black ; and others again black altogether. It 

 is not yet known whether these differences indicate species. 



The Two-toed Ant-eater (Mi/rm. didactyla, Lin.). — Size of a Rat, with fulvous woolly hair, and a russet line along 

 the back, the tail prehensile and naked at the tip, and only two claws anteriorly, one of them very large, and four 

 to the hind-foot. [Were it not for the interposition of the preceding species, it is doubtful whether the author 

 would have arranged this curious little animal in the same minimum group as M. jubata : it has been sepa- 

 rated by some naturaUsts ; and its close affinity with the Sloths is very obvious.] 



The Pangolins (Manis, Lin.), — 



Are also without teeth, have an extensile tongue, and subsist on Ants and Termites in the manner ot 



the Tamanduas ; but their body, limbs, and tail, are covered with large trenchant imbricated scales, 



which they elevate in rolling themselves into a ball, when they wish to defend themselves against an 



enemy. All their feet have five toes. Their stomach is slightly divided in the middle part of it, and 



tliey have no coccum. They occur only in the ancient Continent. 



[Four or five species are now ascertained, inhabiting Asia and Africa, and varying from three to five feet in 

 length]. The Short-tailed Pangolin (3/. pentadactyla, Lin.), is the Phattagen of ^lian. An unguinal phalanx has 

 been found, in the Palatinate, of a Pangolin that must have been twenty feet long, or more. (See Cuv., On. foss. 

 vol. V. part 1, p. 193.) 



The third tribe of Edentata comprehends animals which M. Geoffrey designates 



MONOTBEMATA, 



On account of their having but one external opening for all their excretions. Their genera- 

 tive organs present extraordinary anomalies : though without a ventral pouch, they have 

 nevertheless the same supernumerary bones to the pubis as the Marsiipiata ; the vasa defc' 

 rentia terminate in the urethra, which opens into the cloaca ; the penis, when retracted, is 

 <lrawn into a sheath, which opens by an orifice near the termination of the cloaca. The only 

 matrix consists of two canals or trunks, each of which opens separately and by a double 

 orifice into the urethra, which is very large, and terminates in the cloaca. As yet naturalists 

 are not agreed as to the existence of their mammae f 5 nor whether these animals are viviparous 



• D>ub«nton hu 'teicribed two imtll ipptndagei In the if. di- f M. Meckel considerj u luch two glandular mMses whith ht 



i.irlyla, which, in tirictnen, may b>: conkidcred «i coecii. I hare found greatly developed in a female Ornithurynchut. These M. Geof 

 •atii&ed myaelf, however, that they do not exiit in M. lamatidua. Iioy deems to be rathe- glands, analogous to those on the flanks of the 



