THE GIRAFFE 



{Camelopardahs giraffa) 



It was well said by the late Mr. Phil Robinson in his charmingly 

 amusing book " Noah's Ark," that the Giraffe is about the best instal- 

 ment of the impossible that has been vouchsafed to us ; for one could 

 hardly reasonably expect an animal to grow to the height of six 

 yards, which is what the bull Giraffe commonly does, though a twenty- 

 foot specimen is apparently still a desideratum. The cow stands two 

 or three feet shorter. 



It is not only the extreme height, due to the extreme elongation 

 of neck and legs, that makes the Giraffe so remarkable an animal. 

 One curious fact about it is that the neck, long as it is, has only the 

 seven vertebrae almost universal in beasts — no more, in fact, than the 

 almost neckless Hippopotamus possesses. This seems a case of carry- 

 ing the "economy of Nature" rather too far, and accounts for the 

 comparatively stiff appearance of the Giraffe's otherwise graceful neck. 



The feet are noticeable for the fact that they entirely lack the 

 small " false hoofs " so usually found in ruminants, to which group 

 of hoofed animals the Giraffe belongs, only the two large toes — third 

 and fourth — forming the cloven hoof, being present. 



The head presents several points of interest : the nostrils can be 

 closed at will, as in some aquatic animals, and the tongue, which is 

 well developed and more or less prehensile in ruminants generally, 

 possesses these qualities in perfection in the Giraffe, in which it is 

 unusually long and movable ; in colour it is nearly black. The horns 

 are bony prominences covered with the hairy skin : they are common 

 to both sexes, and are found in the new-born calf, in which, how- 

 ever, the bony core seems to be undeveloped, as the horns lie flat 

 back on the head. They also have larger tufts at the tip than in 

 the adult animal. 



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