272 MAMMALIA—ANT-EATER. 
fore feet are armed with four claws, the two middle ones are tle longest, 
those behind have five claws. The hair of his head and body is black and 
white; this animal turns his tail up on his back, and covers with it his 
whole body, when he is inclined to sleep, or wants to shelter himself from 
the rain or the heat of the sun. The long hair of his tail and of his bodv is 
















not round in all its extent; itis flat towards the end, and feels like dry 
grass. He waves his tail frequently and hastily when he is writated, but if 
hangs down when he is composed, and he sweeps the way with it as he 
goes. The tamanoir walks slowly; a man can easily overtake him in 
running ; his feet seem less calculated to walk than to climb, and to fasten 
round bodies; and he holds so fast a branch or a stick, that it is not possible 
to snatch either from him. The second of these animals is that which 
the Americans call 
THE TAMANDUA.! 
He is much smaller than the tamanoir; he is not above eighteen inches 
from the extremities of the snout to the rump; his head is five inches long, 
his snout crooked, and underneath flat and longs; he has a tail ten inches 
long, without hair at the end; his ears are erect, and about an inch in 
length; his tongue is round, eight inches long, and placed in a sort of 
gutter or hollow canal within the lower jaw; his !egs are not above four 
inches in height, his feet are of the same form, and have the same number 
of claws as the tamanoir. He climbs up and holds fast a branch, or a stick, 
like the tamanoir, and his march is equally slow. He does not cover him- 
self with his tail, which cannot shelter him, being almost bare; the hair of 
the fore part is shorter than that of the tamanoir; when he sleeps he hides 
his head under his neck and his fore legs. The third of these animals is 
that which the naturalists of Guiana call 
1 Myrmecophaga tridactyla, Lux. 
