CLASS I. MAMMALIA: ORDER 7. RODENTIA. 399 



very formidable appearance. They are not capable of being detached by the animal. The tail- 

 qnills are, as it were, cut off in the middle, and are consequently open at the ends, and produce a 

 loud rustling noise when the animal agitates its tail. 



The Porcupine is a nocturnal animal, sleeping in the burrow which it digs, and to which there 

 are several openings, during the day, and coming forth at nightfall to seek its food, consisting 

 principally of roots, fruits, and tender leaves. Its usual food near the Cape, where it is called 

 Yzer-Varken, is the root of that beautiful plant, the Calla ^Ethiopica, which grows even in the 

 ditches about the gardens; but it will frequently deign to put up with cabbages and other vege- 

 tables, and sometimes commits great depredations in the gardens themselves. It undergoes a 

 partial hibernation, but its sleep is not of long duration, for it ventures abroad again at the very 

 commencement of spring. The young are produced in August, and have very small spines. 



The ancients were acquainted with the Porcupine, and Aristotle alludes to the story of its 

 power in shooting its quills to a distance at its enemy, showing that this illusion had thus early 

 taken possession of the popular mind. The tale is dwelt upon by Pliny with his usual love of 

 the marvelous, and ^Elian, Oppian, and Claudian have repeated the story with exaggerations. In 

 suddenly raising his spiny armor, a loose quill may be detached by the Porcupine, but the power 

 of ejaculation to a distance does not exist. 



The use of the quills is simply that of a defensive armor, but as this seems a cumbrous device 

 for such a purpose, we are led to insist on finding other advantages to be derived from them. 

 Hence, Thunberg tells us that he was informed that the Ceylonese Porcupine had "a very curious 

 method of fetching water for its young, namely, the quills in the tail are said to be hollow, and 

 to have a hole at the extremity, and that the animal can bend them in such a manner as that they 

 can be filled with water, which afterward is discharged in the nest among the young." Such 

 inventions, to help nature out, so as to satisfy a narrow conception of her works, are doubtless the 

 source of many of the common-place errors in respect to animals of peculiar organization; but the 

 truth certainly is, that the Porcupine finds his quill armor an exceedingly convenient, useful, and 

 effective defense, and he would be as imperfect without it as a wasp without its sting, or a cock 

 without his spurs. The Porcupine is an exceedingly stupid creature, and hence, no doubt, nature 

 supplied him with his formidable covering as a compensation for his lack of brains; as an indis- 

 pensable provision in order to put him on a level with other brutes of his order. The mode by 

 which nature equalizes her favors are infinitely diversified: some animals she endows with in- 

 stincts, some with gifts analogous to reason, some with strength, some with dexterity, some with 

 , defensive or offensive weapons. The hare has speed, the squirrel activity, the marmot caution, 

 the beaver ingenuity, the rat most or all of these qualities; the Porcupine, destitute of all, has 

 his quiver of arrows, which he shakes in the face of his foe, to frighten him if he is a coward, 

 and to pierce him if he has the courage to make an attack. In case of need, he will run back- 

 ward at his enemy, and thus strike his sharp-pointed arrows into him. Without his quills, the 

 Porcupine would seem to be a singularly unmeaning, uncouth, and helpless sot; with them, he 

 has a position in history, and figuresin literature as the emblem of human fretfulness and conceit. 



The geographical distribution of the common Porcupine appears to be extensive. It is found 

 wild in Italy, and is sometimes brought into the markets of Rome, wdiere it is eaten, though its 

 flesh is not highly esteemed ; it is very rare in all the rest of Europe. It inhabits India, the sand 

 hills along the southwestern shores of the Caspian Sea, Southern Tartary, Persia, Palestine, and 

 the greater part of Africa. 



The other species of this genus are the White-tailed Porcupine, H. leucurus, the Sayal of 

 the Mahrattas, described by Colonel Sykes, and the H. Hodgsoni, or Ckestless Nepaul Porcu- 

 pine. 



Genus ACANTHION: Acanthion. — Of this there are two species, very imperfectly known: the 

 t A. Javanicum, found in Java, and resembling the H. cristata, but somewhat larger, and the A. 

 Daubentonii, probably a native of Africa, also resembling the H. cristata, *but even larger than 

 the A. Jawanicum. 



Genus ATHERURE: Atherurus. — Of this genus there are two known species, the most noted 

 'of which is the Fasciculated Porcupine, A. fasciculatus, the Malacca Porcupine of Buffon. 



