. The naturalist's library : containing scientific and popular descriptions of man, quadrupeds, birds, fishes, reptiles and insects . supposesthat it has a sufficiency, it quickly withdraws the tongue, and swallowsthem at once. This operation it repeats till it is satisfied, or till the ants,grown mere cautious, will be no longer allured to their destruction. Theant-eaters are found in America; the pangolin and the phatagin, in the EastIndies, and in Africa, where the negroes call them quogelo. They eat theirflesh, which they reckon a delicate, wholesome food; they also use theirscales for dif
. The naturalist's library : containing scientific and popular descriptions of man, quadrupeds, birds, fishes, reptiles and insects . supposesthat it has a sufficiency, it quickly withdraws the tongue, and swallowsthem at once. This operation it repeats till it is satisfied, or till the ants,grown mere cautious, will be no longer allured to their destruction. Theant-eaters are found in America; the pangolin and the phatagin, in the EastIndies, and in Africa, where the negroes call them quogelo. They eat theirflesh, which they reckon a delicate, wholesome food; they also use theirscales for differeht purposes. Their mode of killing it is by beating it withclubs. The pangolin and the phatagin have nothing forbidding but theirfigure; they are gentle, harmless, and innocent; they feed upon insectsonly; they never run fast, and can only escape the pursuit of men by hidingthemselves in hollow rocks, or in holes which they dig for themselves; theyare two extraordinary species, not numerous, nor very useful; their oddform seems to place them as an intermediate class betwixt the quadrupeds^nd the reptiles. THE CHLAMYPHORUSi. A^^jcen discovered only within the hist five years. From the tip of thenose to the root of the tail, it measures but five inches and a quarter; its 1 Chlamyphnrus trtincatus, Harlan. This animal, which is the only one of the genus,has sixteen upper and as many lower teeth, all molars; the two first in each jaw pointed,the nst flat and cylindrical ; shell composed of a series of transverse plates; toes fivebefori. and behind, with compressed nails ; tail short, turned downward. 278 MAMMALIA—PLATYPUS. height at the shoulder is only one inch and three quarters, and the lengthof its lail is one inch. This is rather less than half the size of the threebanded armadillo. It is a native of South America. THE DUCK-BILLED PLATYPUS.^ New Holland is the country that produces this anomalous animal, oneof the strangest sports of nature, as it combines the bill of a
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Keywords: ., bookauthordwightjonathan185, bookcentury1800, booksubjectzoology
