Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/594

576 evening it quits this hiding-place and begins to move about, advancing either by leaps, or else with an unsteady gait, walking nearly always on the extremities of its digits. Whatever may have been written heretofore by naturalists, the orycteropus is in fact digitigrade rather than plantigrade. When the animal is walking the head is inclined, the snout nearly touching the ground, the ears laid half-way back, and the tail trailing. From time to time the animal stops to listen: it is guided principally by hearing and smell, and by the same means contrives to escape from its enemies. On finding a path that has been traveled over by ants or termites, it follows it up to the ant-hill; having reached the latter, it attacks the structure with its paws, making the dust fly all around, and digging rapidly till it comes to the center, or at least to one of the principal streets. Then, alternately exserting and retracting its viscous tongue, it devours the ants by the thousands. Having made an end of one nest it attacks another, and so on till its hunger is appeased. When we consider the alarming rate at which ants and termites multiply, and the damage they cause, we must recognize in the orycteropus one of the most efficient of man's auxiliaries in tropical regions.

The orycteropi are extremely timid: at the slightest noise they try to get underground. If they find no suitable hole or crevice, then they quickly dig for themselves a hiding-place. The late J. Verreaux, who had many a time observed orycteropi at the Cape, has told me of how, having once seized by the tail one of them when it had got but half of its body underground, he could not get the animal out except by having the ground dug to a considerable depth. In eastern Africa the negroes, approaching cautiously, kill the orycteropus by a sudden thrust of a lance before it has time to disappear. In Senegal, on the other hand, the animal is caught in iron traps, or hunted with dogs by night. The skin of the animal is thick, and makes good, strong leather. The flesh is by some travelers described as juicy, with a taste like that of pork; according to others it is disgusting, being strongly impregnated with ant-odor. Levaillant could never bring himself to eat of it.

In captivity the orycteropus seems stupid, passing most of the day in sleep, rolled up into a shapeless mass. The individual at the Jardin des Plantes, since winter came in, never quits its nest till about five or six o'clock in the evening. Then it begins to roam about its quarters, returning constantly to the stove, where it warms itself with evident pleasure while it squats on its hind legs and keeps its snout steadily pointed at the fire.