THE LIFE OF MAMAIALS 
Here, in the course of years, accumulates a grisly collection of broken 
bones; for often it can find nothing better than a skeleton which the jackals 
and vultures have picked clean, leaving the bones to be cracked for their 
marrow in the vicelike jaws of this slinking marauder. This hyena is a 
solitary animal, more than a pair being rarely seen, nor are even they often 
visible, since their visits to cultivated districts are, as a rule, made only 
during the dark hours. In Egypt they commonly select some hill in the 
desert, the weathered beds of which afford the only protection against the 
sun. ‘‘They sleep hard throughout the day, selecting that part of their 
domicile which affords the greatest comfort, taking into account the direc- 
tion of the wind, heat of the sun, etc. When disturbed they show no 
fight, but only an anxiety to make off with all possible haste.” Anderson 
further observes that the animal keeps its coat very clean, and is usually 
silent. In Asia, as in Egypt, this hyena is more hated than feared, and both 
Hindoos and Arabs charge it, probably with truth, with digging human 
corpses out of graves and devouring them. Hence the Hindoos are likely 
to put a captured one to death by torture. The Arabs do not do this, but 
cherish many superstitions about the beast, as that it changes its sex from 
year to year; that its humanlike howls are a lure for the unwary; and that 
it has in its eye a stone which if placed under a man’s tongue endows him 
with the gift of prophecy. The Arabs of Mesopotamia say it understands 
Arabic; and when they creep into its den, and put a rope around its craven 
neck, they flatter it with apologies and compliments as they haul it out, and 
imagine it fooled into its cowardly acquiescence. Yet Anderson found the 
Nile men very keen to obtain its heart, which they eat, believing that they 
thus absorb the ‘‘courage”’ of the brute. They also save the whiskers to 
wear as a charm. This hyena frequently seizes dogs or even sheep and 
kids, and rushes away to its den, whence they are sometimes recovered 
with no serious injury, if quickly followed; but it never attacks larger ani- 
mals or human beings. 
The brown hyena, or “‘straand wolf,” is a related species 
native to the southern and castern coast-regions of Africa, 
in which the dorsal crest becomes so long as to hang like a 
mantle, concealing the body and neck on each side; this mantle 
is dark elsewhere but nearly white on the cheeks and throat, 
giving the effect of gray side whiskers to the face. Not much 
is known of its manner of life. 
More familiar to readers of books of travel is the spotted 
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