FAINT VERSUS FEINT 
dactyle series, for we know from much evidence that 
when a group appears it comes into existence in a 
modest and shrinking way, to wax fat later in its history. 
Smallness of size is a great advantage in the battle of 
life, especially when there is not much in the way of 
defence. This animal being hornless must trust to 
size and swiftness for escape. It is said, however, to 
add to these two qualities a third, that of cunning. 
These little deer behave in the face of danger like a 
good many animals belonging to quite different groups 
of the animal world. Beetles, opossums and raccoons, 
when hard pressed, and when avenues of escape seem 
to be cut off, feign death, and then, when the danger 
has passed by, get up and run away. It is, however, 
a question whether this shamming is really a trick, 
or whether it is a genuine faint or cataleptic trance 
produced by the near proximity of the terrible. The 
mind of the beetle would seem to be too embryonic to 
have contracted an advantageous trick with a bene- 
ficial result. But on the other hand it might be urged 
that the nerves of the beetle were of iron from their 
very imperfection, so that a possible explanation is 
hemmed round on all sides with difficulty. 
A careful inspection of the cunning “ Kanchil,” as the 
Malays call the animal, will show that it has what 
few ruminants have, quite formidable tusks in the 
upper jaw. These tusks have led to the quite erroneous 
confusion of Tvagulus with Moschus, the musk deer, a 
totally different animal, a definite deer belonging to 
the family Cervide, though usually dignified with a 
sub-family to itself. In the Kanchil or Meminna, to use 
two of its native names, these tusks play, it is asserted, 
a somewhat novel part for tusks to play. These teeth, 
which correspond of course to the tearing canines of the 
Carnivora, are alleged, with what truth we cannot say, 
to allow the kanchil to suspend itself from the branch of 
WA 
ot 
