MONOTHKMATA. 
IT) 
and this spur is moveable, perforated, and supplied with a 
gland, and muscles capable of ejecting the secretion of the 
gland through the canal of the spur, as in the animal just 
mentioned. Messrs. Quoy and Guimard tried, by irritating 
the animal, to induce it to inflict a wound upon themselves, 
that they might clear up the disputed point as to whether this 
apparatus was poisonous, but were as unsuccessful as Mr. 
Bennett, when he tried a similar experiment with the Orni- 
thorhynchus; and they state that, after repeated inquiries, 
they could not learn that any accident had ever happened 
from a wound of the spur. 
The French naturalists just mentioned procured a specimen 
of an Echidna (the E. setota) at Van Diemens Land, which 
they kept alive for some time. They describe it as an apathetic 
and stupid animal; and state, that for the first month after its 
capture it took no sustenance whatever, but at the end of that 
time it began to lap, and finally to cat somo food prepared for 
it, consisting of a mixture of flour, water, and sugar. It 
avoided the light, and remained during the day partially rolled 
up, having its head bent forwards between its fore legs. 
The rapidity with which it burrowed was astonishing; being 
placed in a large case full of earth, containing plants, it 
worked its way to the bottom in less than two minutes. The 
naked snout, although highly sensitive, assists the feet in 
the labour. 
Messrs. Bass and Flinders, when at Twofold Bay, state 
that their dogs found a Porcupino Ant-eater, but that the 
dogs could make no impression on the animal, which escaped 
by burrowing in the loose sand, not head foremost, hut by 
sinking itself directly downwards, and thus presenting nothing 
hut his prickly back to his adversaries. 
Lieutenant Breton succeeded in keeping one of these ani¬ 
mals alive for somo time, feeding it at first upon ants’ eggs 
and milk; but afterwards, when on shipboard, its food con- 
