THE ARMADILLO. 431 



with great activity. It makes a noise somewhat like the 

 grunting of a young pig. It lives upon fruits and tender 

 plants, going out from its hole to forage at night, but gener- 

 ally remaining concealed during the daytime. When alarmed 

 it readily takes to the water, and dives and swims remark- 

 ably well. 



Bates describes a tame cutea, or an agouti, which he found 

 feeding in the neighbourhood of a village, nibbling the fallen 

 fruits of the inaja-palm. On his trying to catch it, instead of 

 betaking itself, as he thought it would, to the thicket, it ran 

 off to the house of its owners, which was at a distance of 

 about two hundred yards. 



The paca and agouti belong to the peculiar family of the 

 rodent order confined to South America, and which connects 

 the Rodentia to the Pachydermata — the order to which the 

 elephant, horse, and hog belong. 



The fossil toxodon resembled the Rodentia in its dentition, 

 and, at the same time, was nearly related to the elephant. 

 These facts make it probable that these animals are living 

 representatives of a group which existed at a distant epoch of 

 the world's history, and which possessed a structure partak- 

 ing of the character of the two great orders — Rodentia and 

 Pachydermata — now so widely distinct in the majority of forms. 



THE ARMADILLO. 



In days gone by, huge monsters — their backs covered with 

 bony armour — ten feet and upwards in length, some perhaps of 

 the bulk of the rhinoceros, crawled along the plains of South 

 America. They have become creatures of the past, and their 

 places have been taken by others of a similarly curious forma- 

 tion, of which even the giant armadillo, when compared to 



