MAMMALOGY. 



them by the Chinese are probably no other than that they are a 

 social though subordinate race of beings, and gifted with under- 

 standings scarcely less rational than that at least of ferine or un- 

 tutored man. Notwithstanding their deformity they walk nearly 

 erect, and the bravery of the male, like the prudence of the female 

 and young, is at once expressed ; they are supposed to be on an ex- 

 cursion in quest of fruit, their natural subsistence, and the dangers 

 to which they are apparently exposed is exemplified in the necessity 

 of the male proceeding with them armed, to protect and defend them. 

 We shall only add, that this group of figures is selected from a set 

 of drawings sanctioned by the favourable opinions of the Chinese, 

 and no doubt express their ideas of those animals, with which they 

 have become acquainted by means not perhaps at present known to 

 any of the European naturalists. 



'The figure that appears on the left side of the plate at the 

 bottom will convey an idea sufficiently accurate of the anomalous 

 object denominated the MERMAID," the particulars of whose 

 conformation has been developed with some minuteness in the note 

 subjoined to the description of the Rufous Orang-Outang, and in 

 further elucidation of that curious subject of enquiry there are two 

 representations of those ideal, or rather mythological objects repre- 

 sented by certain Japanese artists, whose labours have been 

 introduced into Europe by the late Dr. Suttzer. The upper figure 

 appears in a Japanese Miscellany, the lower one in an Encyclopaedia 

 of their arts and science. We have already in several instances 

 alluded pretty fully to those figures in the course of our enquiry 

 respecting the pretended " Mermaid in both the uj)per half 

 resembles the human figure, the lower portion that of a fish; (he 



