226 THE CAPE HYENA. 



blotched with circular black spots. The tail sixteen inches ; hairs on the back of the 

 neck and withers long, forming a reversed mane. 



The proper duty of this creature appears to be that of scavenger, and is, with regard 

 to the beasts, what the vulture is to the birds ; but owing to its great appetite, and 

 naturally voracious disposition, it does not appear contented with merely the carrion 

 which it might procure, but employs its strength and speed in destroying the flocks and 

 herds of the colonists, or in killing such antelopes as it is enabled to capture. 



If this animal possessed courage in proportion to its strength it would be a very 

 formidable opponent to man, and, as it hunts frequently in packs, might test the skill 

 and boldness of the hunter, but, fortunately, its principal characteristic is cowardice. 



Owing to the custom prevalent amongst many of the South African tribes of expos- 

 ing their dead to be devoured by beasts of prey, the Hyena has acquired the taste for 

 human flesh, and therefore cases are on record of the huts of Kaffirs having been en- 

 tered by it, and the children carried off and devoured. Most ably does the Hyena 

 perform his functions in the economy of nature. Whilst the lion selects the choice parts 

 of a slain animal, and the vulture those which he cannot eat, the Hyena comes and 

 ,finishes hide, bones, and other remnants which have been too tough for the digestion 

 of the others. 



It appears to be a law of nature that those animals which take the shortest time to 

 fill their stomachs can go the longest time without eating. For example, the horse and 

 the ox will take from half an hour to one hour and a half to feed, and they will both 

 suffer if they are kept more than a day without food. The wolf and the dog can make 

 a very satisfactory meal in about two minutes, and either can remain two or three days 

 without suffering much for want of a meal. We may even remark that this instinctive 

 mode of eating food is prevalent among human beings. 



The rough ploughboy, whose meals are limited in number to one or two daily, and 

 are composed of coarse bread and fat bacon, swallows in a few minutes these articles 

 of food in great morsels which he can hardly force into his mouth, and which he 

 scarcely takes the trouble to masticate. The food which is thus taken into the system 

 will repel the feeling of faintness consequent on an empty stomach much more than if 

 it were leisurely eaten and properly subjected to the action of the teeth. This result 

 is only natural, for the better food is masticated, the sooner is it digested. 



The Hyena in the Zoological Gardens appears well acquainted with this fact, for on 

 one occasion, being anxious to see how easily he crushed a huge bone of beef, I took 

 my station in front of his cage, just before feeding time. After the usual laugh had 

 been extracted from crowd and Hyena, a leg of beef was forced under the bars, and 

 was seized by the hysterical scavenger. A few strips of flesh were torn off and swallowed, 

 and then there remained about nine inches of bone and sinew ; instead of crushing these 

 into little pieces, and then swallowing it, as I expected, the wise animal just turned the 

 bone ' head on,' took it in his jaws, made a face, contorted his body, and that solid 

 mass was deposited in the yawning sarcophagus. The crowd laughed and dispersed, but 

 did not remark what experience had probably taught this prisoner, viz., that when he 

 swallowed the bone whole he was not so famished by the next day's dinner-hour as when 

 he ground it up into small pieces. This Hyena, having but little variety of occupation 

 for its mind, had probably devoted much patient thought to the adjustment of this 

 fact. 



The Hyena usually lives in holes, or amongst rocks in retired localities, and when 

 the sun has set he comes forth and searches for food. He then utters a long melan- 

 choly howl, which finishes with a sort of bark, and occasionally that fiend-like laugh 

 which, when heard in the desert, amid scenes of the wildest description, calls up in the 

 imagination of the solitary traveller the forms of some spectral ghouls searching for 

 their unnatural feast. 



The smell of the Hyena is so rank and offensive that no animal, other than of its 

 own species, will come near the carcass. Dogs, when they come across the scent of 

 the Hyena, at once show signs of fear ; they will scarcely leave their master, 

 and, bristling manes and wild looks, examine every inch of ground over which 

 they pass. 



