ADVENTURES AND INCIDENTS. 403 



good pace ; and he invariably immediately shaped his course 

 toward the nearest tree. But, if I put him upon a smootli 

 and well-trodden part of the road, he appeared to be in 

 trouble and distress. His favorite abode was the back of a 

 chair ; and, after getting all his legs in a line upon the top- 

 most part of it, he would hang there for hours together, 

 and often, with a low and inward cry, would seem to invite 

 me to take notice of him. 



5. The sloth, in its wild state, spends its whole life in 

 trees, and never leaves them but through force, or by ac- 

 cident ; and, -what is more extraordinary, not upon the 

 branches, like the squirrel and the monkey, but under 

 them. He moves suspended from the branch, he rests sus- 

 pended from it, and he sleeps suspended from it. To ena- 

 ble him to do this, he must have a very different formation 

 from that of any other known quadruped. 



6. It must be observed that the sloth does not hang 

 head downward like the vampire. When asleep, he sup- 

 ports himself from a branch parallel to the earth. He first 

 seizes the branch with one arm, and then with the other ; 

 and, after that, brings up both his legs, one by one, to the 

 same branch, so that all four are in line. He seems per- 

 fectly at rest in this position. Now, had he a tail, he 

 would be at a loss to know what to do with it in this posi- 

 tion ; were he to draw it up within his legs, it would inter- 

 fere with them ; and were he to let it hang down, it would 

 become the sport of the winds. Thus his deficiency of tail 

 is a benefit to him ; it is merely an apology for a tail, scarcely 

 exceeding an inch and a half in length. 



7. I observed, when he was climbing, he never used his 

 arms both together, but first one, and then the other, and 

 so on alternately. There is a singularity in his hair, differ- 

 ent from that of all other animals, and, I believe, hitherto 

 unnoticed by naturalists ; his hair is thick and coarse at 

 the extremity, and gradually tapers to the root, where it 



