240 CLASS MAMMALIA. 



and wet that it can be preserved. When the temperature is 

 low, and many of these animals are kept in one place, they 

 huddle together to increase the warmth ; but this resource 

 is weak, and if the cold continue, and they continue to be 

 unprotected from it, they quickly perish. Curiosity is the 

 only motive to keep them, for they are not eaten, and their 

 fur is of no value. 



The mode of living of these animals is the same as all 

 the other Rodentia which have cheek teeth without dis- 

 tinct roots ; they feed exclusively on vegetable substances, 

 unless a perversion of appetite, caused by confinement or 

 by hunger, induce them to eat flesh, like the Cows in 

 Iceland, which feed on dried fish for want of their more 

 natural food. Although not provided with clavicles, they 

 convey the food to the mouth with the fore feet. They 

 drink lapping, though but seldom, whence originated the 

 idea that they never drink, and the common practice of 

 keeping them without water ; this they endure very well, 

 so long as their vegetable food is fresh, but when fed on dry 

 matter, there is no doubt they suffer from this unnatural 

 privation. 



When they are pleased, they make a continued gentle 

 murmur ; if frightened, they utter a sharp cry, and their 

 desires they express by a slight grunt. 



This grunting has doubtless induced the very ill-applied 

 vulgar name by which they are known. 



They measure £rom eight inches to a foot in length. 



" The Aperea," says M. F. Cuvier, " was the only spe- 

 cies of Anoema hitherto known ; but another remained 

 hidden, and which is one third larger than the Aperea or 

 Guinea-pig. The museum of Surgeons'* College in London 

 has had the skull of it for a long time ; it was there, in 

 1814, that I had the first knowledge of it: since then, it 

 has been sent from Brazil to the Museum in Paris, where 

 M. Geoffroy St. Hilaire has named it Hilaria." We have 



