FACTS ABOUT THE LAMA 
true bezards, as they are sometimes called, apparently 
come from the wild goat Capra egagrus. The use of 
these stones was the important one that they were 
believed to be antidotes to poison. In old days, when 
aqua tofana was a more generally used means of in- 
heriting property than now, bezards had a corresponding 
value. It is said that even so recently as 1847 these 
antidotes were in use in Chili. The “‘ Allocamelus,’’ 
as the scholar J. C. Scaliger, and Gesner, following him, 
called the lama, was a beast which was of course un- 
known to Europeans until the sixteenth century ; the 
first example as it appears that was ever exhibited in 
Europe was in 1558. In this year a contemporary 
woodcut exhibited the lama as a beast of colossal size 
in accordance with a custom which has not yet and 
never will die out, of representing anything unknown as 
large— omne ignotum pro magno ” we might better ren- 
der a common saying. This specimen came from the 
“Terra gigantum,” by which is undoubtedly meant 
Patagonia. Others have thought Peru the natural 
home of the lama, as is claimed by the postal authorities 
of that explosive republic. Everyone, in this case 
literally “every schoolboy,’ knows of the beautiful 
Peruvian stamps, green in colour and with lamas figured 
upon them. As a matter of fact, Paleontology seems 
to show that the lamas sprang into being in the north 
and wandered over the isthmus of Panama into South 
America, where they flourished until to to-day, dying 
out in the less congenial north. A singular fact in the 
life history of the lama has been commented upon by 
Mr. W. H. Hudson. It appears that lamas select not 
exactly burying grounds, but places wherein to die. 
When a lama feels that it is not much longer for this 
world, it seeks such a place and turns its face to the 
wall. In this way piles of bones accumulate ; and it 
may be that “ bone beds ”’ of past times which abound 
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