The Desert Pampas. 1 1 



How marvellous a tiring it seems that tlie two 

 species of mammalians — the beaver and the vizcacha 

 — that most nearly simulate men's intelligent actions 

 in their social organizing instincts, and their habita- 

 tions, which are made to endure, should belong to 

 an order so low down as the Rodents ! And in the 

 case of the latter species, it adds to the marvel when 

 we find that the vizcacha, according to "Water- 

 house, is the lowest of the order in its marsupial 

 affinities. 



The vizcacha is the most common rodent on the 

 pampas, and the Rodent order is represented by the 

 largest number of species. The finest is the so-called 

 Patagonian hare — Dolichotis patagonica — a beauti- 

 ful animal twice as large as a hare, with ears shorter 

 and more rounded, and legs relatively much longer. 

 The fur is grey and chestnut brown. It is diurnal 

 in its habits, lives in kennels, and is usually met 

 with in pairs, or small flocks. It is better suited to 

 a sterile country like Patagonia than to the grassy 

 humid plain ; nevertheless it was found throughout 

 the whole of the pampas ; but in a country where 

 the wisdom of a Sir William Harcourt was never 

 needed to slip the leash, this king of the Rodentia 

 is now nearly extinct. 



A common rodent is the coypu— Myiopotamus 

 coypii — yellowish in colour with bright red incisors ; 

 a rat in shape, and as large as an otter. It is 

 aquatic, lives in holes in the banks, and where there 

 are no banks it makes a platform nest among the 

 rushes. Of an evening they are all out swimming 

 and playing in the water, conversing together in 

 their strange tones, which sound like the moans and 



