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VERTEBRATA. 
and helped himself whenever he could. Something;, however, was generally left for him ; and he 
became so tame, that he stopped when the party stopped, and when any thing was killed, walked 
round and round, licking his jaws in exjsectation of his share. No one ever molested him, and 
therefore he continued quite harmless. 
The Aguara, C, l.jiibatus, of South America, is called the Red Wolf by some authors. It is a 
great plunderer, but flies from man. It seems confined to the marshy districts of Paraguay, 
along the Rio de la Plata. 
From the narratives which are furnished respecting wolves, it would appear that tlie European 
varieties are much more sa-^^age than our oAvn, AVe arc told that a woman, in Russia, accompa- 
nied by three of her children, was one day in a sledge, when they Wfefe pursued by a nmnbor of 
wolves. She put the horse to a gallop, and drove toward her home with the utmost speed. She 
A NV'OMAN AND UER CHILDBBK PDKSUED BY WOLVilS. 
was not far from it ; but the ferocious animals gained iipon her, and were upon the point of rushing 
on to the sledge. For the preservation of her own life, and that of the remaining children, the 
poor frantic creature cast one of them to her blood-thirsty pursuers. This stopped their career 
for a moment ; but, after devouring the poor child, they renewed the pursuit, and a second time 
came up witli the vehicle. The mother, driven to desperation, resorted to the same horrible 
expedient, and threw another of her offspring to the ferocious assailants. The third child was 
also sacrificed in the same way, and soon after, the wretched being reached her home in safety. 
Here she related what had happened, and endeavored to palliate her own conduct, by describing 
the dreadful alternative to which she had been reduced. A peasant, however, who was among 
the bystanders, and heard the recital, took up an axe, and with one blow cleft her skull in two, 
saying, at the same time, that " a mother who could thus sacrifice her children for the preserva- 
tion of her own life, was no longer fit to live." The man was committed to prison, but the 
emperor subsequently granted him a pardon. 
