14 SYSTEM OF NATURE. 
supposed, then Tarsius, Galago and other genera instantly 
fill up the gap, and make the connexion between the Pri¬ 
mates and Glires equally natural; thus this anomalous 
and intermediate form, which has caused so much discus¬ 
sion among the scientific, serves to show the unity of 
design manifested in Nature’s system. From Cheiromys 
w'e pass through the other lemurs to L. tardigradus, whose 
slothful gait “ has caused some authors to assert, in oppo¬ 
sition to Buffon and to truth, that the genus of sloths exists 
also in Asia.”—C. R. A. 
We thus return to that singular and apparently isolated 
being the sloth : I say apparently , for I think not really 
isolated. I have already endeavoured to show his coinci¬ 
dence in many characters with the sloth-monkey and 
orang-otan, and have placed him between them, freely 
admitting that the approach to either is not very close, — 
indeed had it been so it would have become a much more 
difficult task to show an unity and uniformity in system than 
it at present appears. A third, and very unexpected ap¬ 
proach to a widely different group of animals, is also ex¬ 
hibited in the sloth : it has four stomachs, or rather a 
quadruple stomach, precisely analogous to that of the ru¬ 
minants : this fact, together with a second, namely, the 
union of its fingers and toes, and the investment of their 
extremities with great claws almost amounting to hoofs, 
are further and undeniable evidences of this approach : 
thus we find this singular animal manifesting approaches 
to three groups,—the monkeys, the lemurs and the Belluse. 
In connexion with this supposed approach of the sloths 
to the Belluae, it seems desirable to make some allusion 
to those gigantic creatures once possessed of a destruc¬ 
tive power over living vegetables, compared with which 
