SLOTHS, ANT-EATERS, AND ARMADILLOS 301 
a perfectly topsy-turvy manner, inasmuch as it moves from bough to bough with its legs up 
in the air and its back towards the ground. It walks and sleeps suspended beneath the 
boughs instead of balanced above them, securely holding itself by means of powerful hooked 
claws on the fore and hind feet. This method of locomotion, so remarkable in a mammal, 
coupled with the deliberate fashion in which it moves, and the air of sadness expressed in its 
quaint physiognomy. — large-eyed, snub-nosed, and earless —on which there seems to dwell an 
ever-present air of resignation, led the great Buffon to believe that the sloth was a creature 
afflicted of God for some hidden reason man could not fathom! His sympathy was as 
certainly wasted as his hasty conclusion was unjustified. There can be no doubt but that the 
life led by the sloth is at least as blissful as that of its more lively neighbours — the spider 
monkeys, for instance. Walking beneath the boughs comes as natural to the sloth as walking 
on the ceiling to the fly. 
The sloth sleeps, as we have already remarked, suspended from a bough. During this 
time the feet are drawn close together, and the head raised up and placed between the 
fore legs, as in the cobego, 
which we depicted asleep on 7 DEE PS nm 
page 170, as our readers will 
remember. In the sleeping 
position the sloth bears a 
striking resemblance to the 
stump of a lichen-covered 
bough, just as the cobego 
resembles a fruit. Thus is 
protection from enemies 
gained. The resemblance to 
lichen is further aided by the 
fact that the long, coarse hair 
with which the sloth is clothed 
becomes encrusted with a 
peculiar green alga —a lowly 
form of vegetable growth— Yi ' 
whichlodgesincertaingrooves | i 
or flutings peculiar to the Photo by L, Medland, F.Z.S. 
hair of this animal. Such a THREE_TOED SLOTH 
method of protection 12 Be A remarkable peculiarity about the three-toed sloths is the fact that they have no less than nine 
amongst the Mammalia. As vertebra in the neck, instead of seven, as is usual among mammals : 
the sloths sleep by day 
and feed by night, the usefulness of such a method of concealment is beyond question. 
The strange form of locomotion of the sloths renders separate fingers and toes unnecessary, 
and so the fingers and toes have come to be enclosed in a common fold of skin, extending 
down to the base of the claws. . 
The sloths stand out in strong contrast to the volatile spider monkeys, with whom they 
share the forest; these have added a fifth limb in the shape of a prehensile tail, by which 
they may suspend themselves at will. The sloths, on the contrary, have no tail; they move 
deliberately, and do not require it. The monkeys move by prodigious leaps, taken not seldom 
by gathering impetus by swinging on their tails. 
The great naturalist Bates writes of the sloth: “It is a strange sight to watch this 
uncouth creature, fit production of these silent shades, lazily moving from branch to branch. 
Every movement betrays, not indolence exactly, but extreme caution. He never loses his hold 
from one branch without first securing himself to the next... . After watching the animal 
for about half an hour, I gave him a charge of shot; he fell with a terrific crash, but caught 
a bough in his descent with his powerful claws, and remained suspended. Our Indian lad 
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