62 WILD NEIGHBORS CHAP. 
even humanity possesses the rudiment of a tail 
concealed beneath the skin. The same is true of 
the more human-like kinds of monkeys (the apes). 
Some tails, like those of the bear, deer, and goat, 
are so short, stubbed, and immovable as to defy 
any attempt to perceive a present purpose in their 
existence. Of what possible use to a turtle, for 
example, is its tail? None, apparently, whatever 
might have been the case in the differently con- 
stituted ancestors of the turtle. This part has sim- 
ply remained after its service in chelonian economy 
had been long outgrown, as buttons are still sewed 
upon the sleeves of our coats, although a century 
has elapsed since men thus fastened back their 
too voluminous cuffs. 
It is a survival of the misfit. 
Indeed, it would not be easy, were one to insist 
upon visible utility in every case, to prove the 
serviceability of some of the most pretentious of 
these appendages. Look at the wild cats. The 
panther and the ocelot have long and graceful 
tails; the lynxes own the merest apology for one, 
and are irreverently dubbed “bobcats” in the 
West. Yet you cannot say that the former species 
thrives better than the latter. Length or brevity 
of tail seems to have nothing to do with either 
habits or happiness. Thus the wrens and our 
various thrashers (Harporhynchi) are cousins-ger- 
man ; yet the wren’s tail is an absurd little tuft of 
short feathers “weel cockit” over his rump, and 
