SPINY ANTEATERS — PLATYPUS, OR DUCKBILL 243 



a good meal only once in the two days. A large adult will easily take an ordinary 

 tea-cupful of milk and mince-meat. 



" If an echidna be placed on an ants' nest it at once sets to work. Seated on a 

 tripod, formed of the two hind legs well advanced and the little stumpy tail, it 

 uses its front feet and its snout for opening up the various passages. The long- 

 sharp snout is thrust down one of the passages, and from it the long vermiform 

 tongue sweeps out and in all the neighbouring passages, clearing them in a few 

 seconds of all ants and eggs. The tongue can be put out about 4 inches, and has a 

 curious power of following the exact curves and twists of the passages. When 

 the snout is deeply pushed into a passage, the point of the tongue will be seen 

 whipping out and in other passages 2 or 3 inches away. When the ants 

 have been cleared out of all the passages, the long front claws are pushed in by 

 the side of the snout, and the passage forcibly opened up, allowing the snout to go 

 an inch or so deeper. The pupas and larva? seem to be especially relished, and seem 

 always to be preferred to the ants themselves. 



" In the Taralga district the echidna seems to breed about September and 

 October — considerably later than in the warmer parts of Australia, where July is 

 apparently the usual season. One or two eggs are laid about twenty-seven days 

 after pairing. When the egg is laid the degreee of development of the embryo 

 corresponds roughly to that of a third-day chick or a ten-days' rabbit. The 

 amnion is not closed, and the allantois has apparently not begun to form. It is 

 probably a couple of weeks later before the egg is hatched. During the period 

 of incubation the egg is carried about by the mother, placed in the bottom of 

 the temporary pouch, and secured by the abdominal hairs plastered across it. 

 After hatching, the young is apparently carried about till it is a good size, and 

 able to look after itself." 



Echidna aculeata is common to Tasmania, the whole of Australia, and New 

 Guinea, although each country has its own local races. The Tasmanian race 

 (E. a setosa), for example, has more hair and bristles between the spines than the 

 typical echidna of the Australian mainland, while the Papuan representative of 

 the species (E. a. lawesi) carries more spines on the head. The Tasmanian echidna, 

 which is the largest, measuring about 20 inches in length, has also a shorter beak 

 and spines, the latter being in some examples almost completely buried in the 

 dense coat of dark brown hair, which is marked on the breast with a couple of 

 white spots. All the races have five claws to the feet, those of the front pair 

 being broad and nail-like, while those behind are narrow and strongly curved. 

 Platypus, or The uncouth skin-clad beak from which the duckbilled platypus 



Duckbill. (Omithorhynchus anatinus) derives the first half of its name serves 

 to render this animal absolutely unmistakable at the first glance. So different is 

 it from the echidnas, that it is referred to a separate family, the Ornitlwrhynchidce, 

 of which it is the sole living representative, although a second has been named on 

 the evidence of fossil remains from the superficial formations of Australia. In 

 length the duckbill measures about 18 inches, or, inclusive of the tail, nearly 

 2 feet ; and is of a stout and bloated appearance, the body being rounded and 

 somewhat depressed. The coat consists of short, velvety black hair ; external ears 

 are lacking, and the eyes are relatively small. Like those of the spiny anteater, 



