CHAPTER XIII 
NO EYES, AND MULTIPLE EYES 
W E are all aware that the young of many 
different kinds of animals are born 
blind, but it is not so generally known that 
some creatures pass the whole of their existence 
in that state ; their blindness being a normal and 
not an accidental condition, and accounted for 
by the fact that they have no external eyes or 
merely rudimentary vestiges of those organs. 
Among the mammals that are unable to see 
is the long-snouted dolphin or susu, found in 
the Ganges, Indus and Bramaputra rivers. It 
occasionally grows to a length of rather more 
than nine feet, and is curious in the fact that 
its back fin is rudimentary and merely repre¬ 
sented by a low ridge. The front of its head, 
moreover, rises so abruptly from the base of its 
long snout as to make the creature look as if 
it were suffering from water on the brain. 
It feeds principally upon fish and prawns, 
searching for the same by probing amidst the 
mud with its sensitive beak, the jaws of which 
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