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第2章 住院部轮岗

alternating with an equal number of grayish.

[154]

The whole of the genus thus characterized are natives of Madagascar and of two or three of the smaller islands in its immediate vicinity. They appear to occupy in that remarkable and very imperfectly known country the place of the Monkeys, none of which have yet been detected within its precincts. They are said to live in numerous troops upon the trees, and to feed upon fruits and insects; but their habits in a state of nature have not yet been observed with sufficient accuracy to enable us to form any clear idea of their mode of existence. In captivity they are particularly tame and good tempered, fond of being noticed, delighting in motion, and climbing and leaping with surprising agility. They are, however, in some degree nocturnal; and when undisturbed pass a considerable portion of the day in sleep. If alone, they roll themselves up in the form of a ball, and wind their long tail in a very curious manner round their body, apparently for the purpose of keeping themselves warm; for they are naturally chill

Python Tigris. Daud.

In size and form it is smaller and more slender than either the Hy?na or the Wolf. Its ground colour is of a reddish or yellowish brown, which is variously mottled in large patches along the sides of the body and on the legs, with black and white intermingled together. Its nose and muzzle are completely black, and it has a strong black line passing from them up the centre of the forehead to between the ears, which are very large, black both within and without, and furnished with a broad and expanded tuft of long whitish hairs arising from their anterior margin and filling up a considerable part of their concavity. There is a lighter patch on the muzzle beneath each of the eyes. The tail is of moderate length, covered with long bushy hair, and divided in the middle by a ring of black, below which or towards[80] the extremity it is nearly white, as are also the fore parts of the legs below the joint. These colours and markings are subject to variation in different individuals; but in their general disposition a

THE BABOON.

The Eagles, properly so called, are characterized by a head covered with plumage and flattened above; eyes large, lateral, and deep-seated; a bill of great strength, arched and hooked at its extremity alone, and furnished at its base with a naked membrane, called the cere, in which the openings of the nostrils are situated; the wings broad and powerful; the tarsus, or that joint of each leg which is immediately above the toes, strong, short, and covered with feathers down to the very base; the toes thick and naked, three of them pointing forwards, and the fourth constantly directed backwards; and the talons of great power and strongly curved. The Golden Eagle, which occupies the right hand in the cut, is frequently three feet and a half in length from the[201] extremity of the beak to that of the tail. His general colour is blackish brown both above and below, assuming on the legs a grayish or sometimes a reddish tinge. His beak is bluish black, covered at the base by a yellow cere; and his toes, which are al

THE KANGUROO.

y common in the Wolf with the incurved; and this petty distinction, which has little to do with structure, and still less with habits, is hardly deserving of serious attention. More obvious and more essential differences will be found in the cast of his countenance, which derives a peculiar expression from the obliquity of his eyes; in the breadth of his head, suddenly contracting into a slender and pointed muzzle; in the size and power of his teeth, which are comparatively greater than those of any dog of equal stature; in the stiffness and want of pliability of his limbs; in his uniformly straight and pointed ears; and in a black stripe which almost constantly, and in nearly every variety of the species, occupies the front of the fore leg of the adult. His fur, which differs considerably in texture and colour, from the influence of climate and of seasons, is commonly of a grayish yellow, the shades of which are variously intermingled; as he advances in age it becomes lighter, and in high northern latitudes