CHAP, in] A MARSHLAND JOURNEY 71 



we found them in several inches of water. The stomach 

 is thick- walled, like a gizzard ; the stomachs of those 

 we shot contained adult and larval ants, chiefly termites, 

 together with plenty of black mould and fragments of 

 leaves, both green and dry. Doubtless the earth and 

 the vegetable matter had merely been taken incidentally, 

 adhering to the viscid tongue when it was thrust into 

 the ant masses. Out in the open marsh the tamandua 

 could neither avoid observation, nor fight effectively, 

 nor make good its escape by flight. It was curious to 

 see one lumbering off at a rocking canter, the big bushy 

 tail held aloft. One, while fighting the dogs, suddenly 

 threw itself on its back, evidently hoping to grasp a dog 

 with its paws ; and it now and then reared in order to 

 strike at its assailants. In one patch of thick jungle we 

 saw a black howler monkey sitting motionless in a tree- 

 top. We also saw the swamp-deer, about the size of 

 our blacktail. It is a real swamp animal, for we found 

 it often in the papyrus-swamps, and out in the open 

 marsh, knee-deep in the water, among the aquatic 

 plants. 



The tough little horses bore us well through the 

 marsh. Often, in crossing bayous and ponds, the water 

 rose almost to their backs ; but they splashed and waded, 

 and, if necessary, swam through. The dogs were a 

 wild - looking set. Some were of distinctly wolfish 

 appearance. These, we were assured, were descended, 

 in part, from the big red wolf of the neighbourhood, a 

 taU, lank animal, with much smaller teeth than the big 

 northern wolf. The domestic dog is undoubtedly de- 

 scended from at least a dozen different species of wild 

 dogs, wolves, and jackals, some of them probably be- 

 longing to what we style " different genera." The degree 

 of fecundity or lack of fecundity between different 



