Ill THE CAPYBARA OR WATER-HOG 51 



skin in a silk pocket-handkerchief, and so carried it home : this 

 handkerchief, after being well washed, I continually used, and 

 it was of course as repeatedly washed ; yet every time, for a 

 space of one year and seven months, when first unfolded, I 

 distinctly perceived the odour. This appears an astonishing 

 instance of the permanence of some matter, which nevertheless in 

 its nature must be most subtile and volatile. Frequently, 

 when passing at the distance of half a mile to leeward of a 

 herd, I have perceived the whole air tainted with the effluvium. 

 I believe the smell from the buck is most powerful at the 

 period when its horns are perfect, or free from the hairy skin. 

 When in this state the meat is, of course, quite uneatable ; but 

 the Gauchos assert, that if buried for some time in fresh earth, 

 the taint is removed. I have somewhere read that the islanders 

 in the north of Scotland treat the rank carcasses of the fish- 

 eating birds in the same manner. 



The order Rodentia is here very numerous in species : of 

 mice alone I obtained no less than eight kinds.^ The 

 largest gnawing animal in the world, the Hydrochaerus capybara 

 (the water-hog), is here also common. One which I shot at 

 Monte Video weighed ninety-eight pounds : its length, from 

 the end of the snout to the stump-like taiV-was three feet two 

 inches ; and its girth three feet eight. The^e great Rodents 

 occasionally frequent the islands in the mouth of the Plata, 

 where the water is quite salt, but are far more abundant on the 

 borders of fresh -water lakes and rivers. Near Maldonado 

 three or four generally live together. In the daytime they 

 either lie among the aquatic plants, or openly feed on the turf 

 plain.2 When viewed at a distance, from their manner of walk- 

 ing and colour they resemble pigs : but when seated on their 

 haunches, and attentively watching any object with one eye, 



1 In South America I collected altogether twenty-seven species of mice, and 

 thirteen more are known from the works of Azara and other authors. Those collected 

 by myself have been named and described by Mr. Waterhouse at the meetings of the 

 Zoological Society. I must be allowed to take this opportunity of returning my 

 cordial thanks to Mr. Waterhouse, and to the other gentlemen attached to that 

 Society, for their kind and most liberal assistance on all occasions. 



2 In the stomach and duodenum of a capybara which I opened, I found a very 

 large quantity of a thin yellowish fluid, in which scarcely a fibre could be distinguished. 

 Mr. Owen informs me that a part of the oesophagus is so constructed that nothing 

 much larger than a crow-quill can be passed down. Certainly the broad teeth and 

 strong jaws of this animal are well fitted to grind into pulp the aquatic plants on 

 which it feeds. 



