Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 7.djvu/759

Rh desolate solitudes to the west of Imerina, where there are immense tracts that no one has trodden. In one part, Nature displays her boundless riches, where the native can live without working, and civilized man procure the enjoyments of material life; in another, the ungrateful land scarcely yields any food; the rocks are sterile, the soil is bare, and a stream of water to render the existence of man or beast possible, is not to be found.

Climbing with difficulty the high, abrupt downs, the pathway has to be opened through thorny bushes, and plains stretch out at the summit; not a tree or shrub is to be seen; desolate, uninhabitable, and depressing, as the deserts of Egypt and Arabia. After a long march through the sand, a new scene opens; the nopal is now found growing—a sure index to the abode of man. These plants, upon which the cochineal insect chiefly lives, are natives of America, but have long been naturalized in Africa and the south of Europe; the Arabs no doubt introduced them into Madagascar. Wherever a country is unwatered by streams, they are an invaluable resource for the inhabitants. Here, every family possesses its plantations of nopals, and gathers the fruit in a peculiar manner. With the point of their lances, they adroitly detach them, thus avoiding their redoubtable thorns; and roll them in the sand to get rid of the silky covering which incloses these spikes, afterward peeling them with the iron point of the dart. They appease hunger, assuage thirst, and permit the poor people to live in places where, for weeks together, water is not seen.

In these solitudes, where the forests are immense, animal life can multiply without fear of man, and yet the fauna of Madagascar offer some singular features. The traveler can pass along without fear of the lions, leopards, and panthers of Asia and Africa; neither do zebras and quaggas gallop over the plains. In other countries, wherever the climate is hot enough, monkeys enliven the woods; here, not a single species is to be found. The horse and the ass are unknown; and, what is still more extraordinary, ruminants, such as stags and antelopes, are absent. It is true that there are large herds of cattle, which constitute the great riches of the Malagaches, as the natives of Madagascar are called, but they have been imported probably from the southern part of Asia. This species is remarkable from its boss or lump of fat on the back, and is strikingly beautiful when seen in large herds wandering over the plains. The sheep, too, are peculiar, from their enormous tails, which consist of a mass of fat—a common feature in those belonging to the African Continent. Goats are common, as well as wild-pigs, which ravage the plantations; but these are supposed to have all escaped from vessels, and not to be indigenous to the island.

The monkeys of other lands are, however, replaced by the lemurs—graceful little creatures of many different varieties. There is a great resemblance in their attitude and manner of life to the ape, so that