44 THE INSECTIVORA. 



from the other fingers, it is carried so rapidly from the water 

 to the mouth, passing sideways through the lips, that the 

 liquid seems to pass in a continual stream. The natives of 

 Madagascar have a superstitious dread of the animal, believ- 

 ing that the person who kills an Aye-aye will certainly die 

 within a year. This fear, added to the nocturnal habits of 

 the creature, has made it difficult to obtain specimens. 



The Bats may be dismissed in a word or two. The six 

 known species all belong to families which are widely ex- 

 tended over the world ; and they have no special peculiarity 

 of appearance or habit which marks them from the familiar 

 forms found in every tropical country. 



Insectivora. — Coming, however, to the next order of mam- 

 malia, the Insectivora, we find them represented in Mada- 

 gascar by two families, one of which, the shrews, is well known 

 and widely spread, and contains but a single species ; but 

 the other family, that of the Centetidas, is, with the exception 

 of one genus, peculiar to the island. It contains five genera 

 in Madagascar, and nine species. These are all small 

 animals, allied to our European hedgehogs, some of them 

 having a covering of strong spines, while in others it consists 

 rather of firm prickly hairs, which however do not cover the 

 whole of the body. They are used as food, having very 

 much the taste of pork, and are called trdndrdka or tenrec. 

 They are found in the woods, and especially in the low 

 scattered brushwood and fern-overgrown land in the vicinity 

 of the forests, from which the trees have been removed. 

 During our usual yearly holiday at our sanatorium on the 

 outskirts of the inner line of forest, we frequently met with 

 three or four varieties of these harmless creatures while 

 rambling in the outskirts of the woods. Our dog often 

 chased them, but she generally came back with her mouth 

 and nostrils stuck as full of prickles as a pincushion is of 

 pins. Some of the species are prettily banded transversely with 

 alternate shades of dark and light brown, or brown and yellow. 

 One day a female tenrec was brought to us for sale, with 

 eight or nine tiny young ones only a few days old. These 

 were yellow and brown in colour, their hair being still soft ; 

 they were about the size of a large egg, and a most amusin^ 



