CARNIVORA. 
27s 
The hystrix hrachyura of Linnaeus is generally 
thought to be a hedgehog; and Seba describes a 
species without external ears, said to be found in 
America. 
THE TANRECS, OR MADAGASCAR HEDGEHOGS. 
Centenes, Illiger. 
If analogy in external appearance alone be 
adopted in artificially associating or grouping the 
animal world, the three following animals would be 
hedgehogs, as, indeed, they were named by Linnaeus 
and their first describers. But, on the other hand, 
if the form of the teeth be followed in the arrange- 
ment, then must they be separated from their spiny 
consimilars into a distinct genus, which Illiger has 
done, and given to it the name of centenes ; for their 
incisive and canine teeth approach the form of those 
proper to the quadrumana and carnivora, and recede 
from that form in the insectivora in general, which 
inclines to that proper to the teeth of the glires*. 
They have six incisive teeth in each jaw, or four 
above and six below, which, unlike those of the 
* Cuvier divides the insectivora into two principal groups, the 
latter of which contains only the genera tanrec and talpa, including 
the common species and the sorex cristatus of Linnaeus, because the 
teeth of these two genera approach those of the digitigrades and 
plantigrades, and I’ecede from those of the other insectivora. 
