184 Idle Days in Patagonia. 



distinctly until almost within striking distance. 

 Another remarkable case is that of the armadillo. 

 Of two species I can confidently say that, if they 

 are not blind, they are next door to blindness ; yet 

 they are diurnal animals that go abroad in the full 

 glare of noon and wander far in search of food. 

 But their sense of smell is marvellously acute, and, 

 as in the case of the mole, it has made sight super- 

 fluous. To come back to man : if, in a state of 

 nature, he is able to guess the character of objects 

 nine times in ten, or nineteen in twenty, seen as far 

 as he requires to see anything, his intellectual 

 faculties make a better sight unnecessary. If the 

 armadillo's scent had not been so keen, and man 

 had not been gifted with nimble brains, the sight in 

 both cases would have been vastly stronger; but 

 the sharpening of its sense of smell has dimmed the 

 armadillo's eyes and made him blinder than a snake ; 

 while man (from no fault of his own) is unable to 

 see farther than the wolf and the ostrich and the 

 wild ass. 



