306 Proceedings of Learned Societies. 
the animal to escape for more than an hour, and it was not unlit 
it had got experience of the strength of its prison that the Echidna 
began to notice the food which had been placed there. 
This consisted of a saucer of bread and milk and some meal¬ 
worms. The milk was sucked or rather licked in by rapid pro¬ 
trusion and retraction of the long red cylindrical tongue. The 
tongue came more than once in contact with the larvee, which 
were sometimes rolled over by it, but no attempt was made to 
swallow them. 
The moist dark end of the nose felt cold to the touch. The 
temperature of the animal at the cloaca was 85° Falir., or nearly 
ten degrees lower than that of the anus of a rabbit. 
The Echidna offered little resistance when seized by the hind¬ 
leg and lifted off the ground, and made not the slightest demon¬ 
stration of defending himself by striking with his hind-spurs. The 
only action when irritated was to roll itself into a ball, like a 
hedgehog—the bristles being then erect. This was the position 
chosen for sleep; but our Echidna showed little of that sluggish¬ 
ness which the French naturalists ascribe to their live specimen 
on ship-board (Voyage de la Favorite, p. 159). 
The blood-discs manifested the true mammalian type, in their 
number, size, and form. They were flat, circular, averaging 
1-3200th of an inch diameter. A few large ones were rather less 
than l-3000th. The smallest was l-3500th. 
The circular form of the blood-discs of the Echidna was noticed 
by Dr. John Davy in some blood of that animal which had been 
transmitted to him in brine from Van Diemen’s Land. More 
satisfactory observations had been made by Dr. Hobson and Mr. 
E. Bedford on the recent blood of both the Ornithorhynchus and 
Echidna. I have cited these observations in my article “ Mono- 
tremata” (Cyclop, of Nat. Hist.). They show that the blood- 
discs of the Ornithorhynchus are likewise discoid, circular, and 
about l-3000th of an inch in diameter; and the observations now 
made on both ovoviviparous genera demonstrate that the Mono- 
tremata resemble the other Mammalia in the form, proportional 
number, and florid colour of the blood-discs, which correspond in 
size with those of the Armadillo and the Quadrumana, but are 
