Part 14

Although we have only the head of this animal in the royal cabinet, it is too remarkable to be passed over in silence. All naturalists have looked upon it as a kind of hog, though either its head, size, bristles, nor tail, resemble that animal: its legs are longer, and its muzzle shorter; it is covered with short hair, as soft as wool, and its tail is terminated by a tuft of this wool; its body is likewise not so thick and clumsy as that of the hog; its hair is grey, mixed with red and a little black; its ears are short and pointed; but the most remarkable character, and which distinguishes it from all other animals, are four enormous tusks, or canine teeth, the two shortest of which shoot out of the lower jaw, like those of the wild boar, and the two others, which come from the upper jaw, pierce the checks, or rather the upper part of the lips, and rise in a curve almost to the eyes. The tusks are a very beautiful ivory, much smoother and finer, but not so hard as that of the elephant.

The position and the direction of these two upper tusks, which rise upright, and then bend in the form of a circle, have made some skilful naturalists, such as Grew, imagine that these tusks ought not to be looked upon as teeth, but as horns. They founded their opinion upon the circumstance that in all animals the sockets of the teeth in the upper jaw open downwards; that in the babiroussa, as in the other animals, the sockets are turned downwards, except those of these two great tusks, which, on the contrary, are turned upwards; and they concluded from thence, that from this essential character of the upper teeth, these tusks, whose sockets are directed upwards, ought to be looked upon as horns and not as teeth. But these philosophers were deceived; the position or direction is only a circumstance, and not essential to the existence of an object. These tusks, though situate in an opposite manner to that of the other teeth, is only a singularity in the direction, which cannot change the nature of the thing, nor make an ivory horn of a true canine tooth.

These enormous tusks give this animal a very formidable appearance; they are, however, less dangerous than our wild boars. They go in herds, and have a very strong smell, by which they are easily discovered, and are hunted by dogs with good success. They growl terribly, defend themselves, and wound their enemies with their under tusks; for the upper are rather of disservice than of use to them. Although savage and ferocious, they are tamed with great ease; and their flesh, which is very good, putrifies in a short time. As their hair is fine, and their skin delicate, it is soon penetrated by the teeth of dogs, who hunt them in preference to wild boars, and sooner accomplish their purpose. They fasten their upper tusks in the branches of trees, to rest their heads, or to sleep standing. This habit they have in common with the elephant, who, in order to sleep in a standing posture, supports his head by fixing the end of his tusks in the holes which he makes in the walls of his lodging.

The babiroussa differs still more from the wild boar, by his natural appetites; he feeds upon grass and leaves of trees, and does not endeavour to enter gardens to feed on beans, pease, and other vegetables; while the wild boar, who lives in the same country, feeds upon wild fruit, roots, and often destroys the gardens. Besides, these animals who go together in herds, never intermix; the wild boars keep on one side, and the babiroussas on the other. The latter walk quicker and have a very fine smell, and often stand erect against the trees to scent the approach of dogs or hunters. When they are pursued to any great distance they make towards the sea, and, swimming with great dexterity, very often escape their pursuers, for they swim for a long time, and often to very great distances, and from one island to another.

The babiroussa is found not only in the island of Bouro, or Boero, near Amboyna, but also in many parts of the South of Asia, and Africa; as at Celebes, Estrila, Senegal, and Madagascar, for it appears that the wild boars of this island, which Flaccourt speaks of, and says, _that the males chiefly have two horns on the side of their nose_, are babiroussas. We have not had it in our power to determine whether the female has the two tusks which are so remarkable in the male, but most authors seem to agree that they have.

SUPPLEMENT.

Having been favoured with two drawings of this animal, we are now enabled to present a figure of the Babiroussa, (_fig. 160._) and which we believe will give a tolerable idea of him, since it was taken with much care, and is a combination of both; the one of them we received from M. Sonnerat, which represented him in a standing posture, and the other lying on its belly, was sent us from England by Mr. Pennant, with the following label; "a Babiroussa from the island of Banda, drawn from nature;" it is of a blackish colour, grows to the size of a large hog, and its flesh is very good to eat.

THE CABIAI.

This American animal had never been seen in Europe until the Duke of Bouillon procured one to be sent to him from America. As this prince is curious in foreign animals, he has often done me the honour of inviting me to see them; and he has even given me several species for the advantage of this work. This animal (_fig. 161._) was sent very young to him, and had not arrived at its full growth when the cold killed it. It is not a hog, as naturalists and travellers have pretended; it only resembles that animal by trifling marks, and differs from it by striking characters. The largest cabiai is scarcely as big as a hog of eighteen months growth. The head is shorter, and its mouth less; the eyes are larger, the number and form of the teeth are different, it wants a tail, and is web-footed; the hoofs before are divided into four parts, and those behind into three; between the divisions there is a prolongation of the skin, so that the feet, when opened in swimming, can beat a greater surface of water in which it frequently lives; it swims like an otter, seeks the same prey, and seizes the fish with its feet and teeth, and carries them to the banks to eat. It also eats fruits, corn, and sugar-canes. As its feet are broad and flat it often sits upon its hind ones. Its cry more resembles the braying of an ass than the grunting of a hog. It seldom stirs out but at night, and almost always in company without going far from the sides of the water. It can find no safety by flight, from the length of its feet and the shortness of its legs. To escape its enemies it plunges into the water, and remains at the bottom so long that the hunters lose all hopes of seeing it again. It is fat, and the flesh is tender, but, like that of the badger, it tastes more like bad fish than good flesh; the head, however, is not bad, and this agrees with what is said of the badger, his fore parts are pretty good, while his hind ones taste like fish.

The cabiai is quiet and gentle; it is neither quarrelsome nor savage with other animals. It is easily tamed, comes at call, and willingly follows those who feed and treat it with kindness. It was fed at Paris with barley, sallad, and fruit, and was healthy while the weather kept warm. By its number of paps we should suppose that the females produce several young at a litter. We do not know how long they go with young, the time of their growth, nor, consequently, their length of life. The natives, or colonists, of Cayenne might inform us of these particulars, for it is very common in Guiana, as well as in Brasil, in Amazonia, and in all the lower countries of South America.

SUPPLEMENT.

We have been informed by M. de la Borde, that the Cabiai is a common animal in Guiana, and on the borders of the Amazon river; he says that the male and female always go together; that they avoid the habitations of men, and always live by the sides of rivers, into which they go whenever they are disturbed, swimming like hogs to a great distance, sometimes diving to the bottom, where they will remain a considerable time; that the natives frequently take them when very young, and bring them up in their houses, where they soon become familiar, and will eat bread, millet, and herbs, although they principally live on fish when in their wild state; that the females produce but one at a time; that they are perfectly harmless; and that their flesh is white and well tasted. Although this last fact may seem to contradict what we have formerly stated upon the authority of other authors yet it is by no means improbable that their flesh may be bad when in their wild state, from feeding on fish, and yet very good when they live on bread and grain.

As one of these animals lived some time in Paris I am of opinion they would propagate in our climate; and the more especially as I find the one I formerly alluded to was not killed by the cold, but that the winter had no particular effect upon it. I have since been informed that this animal, was confined in an upper room, from the window of which it jumped, and falling into a vessel of water was drowned.

_Engraved for Barr's Buffon_

THE PORCUPINE.

The name given this animal leads to a supposition that it is a hog covered with thorny quills,[AE] when, in fact, it only resembles that animal by its grunting; in every other respect it differs from the hog as much as any other animal, both in its outward appearance and inferior conformation. Instead of a long head and ears, armed with tusks, and terminated with a snout; instead of cloven feet, furnished with hoofs like the hog; the porcupine has a short head like the beaver, two large incisive teeth in each jaw, no tusks or canine teeth, the upper lip divided like that of the hare, the ears round and flat, and the feet armed with claws. Instead of a large stomach, with an appendix in form of a cowl, the porcupine has only a single stomach, with a large cæcum gut. The parts of generation are not apparent, as in the boar, and its testicles are concealed in the groin. By all these marks, together with its short tail, long whiskers, and divided lip it approaches more to the hare or beaver than to the hog. The hedge-hog, indeed, who, like the porcupine, is covered with prickles, somewhat resembles the hog, for it has a long muzzle, terminated by a kind of snout; but all these resemblances being so very slight it is clear that the porcupine (_fig. 162._) is a particular and different species from the hedge-hog, the beaver, the hare, or any other animal whatever.[AF]

[AE] This may be said of it in reference to its French, Italian, and Spanish appellation, but not in regard to its English one. In German too, its name conveys this idea; _stachet-schwein_ literally _swine with thorns_.

[AF] It is probable that the resemblance of the flesh of this animal with that of the hog has contributed more to his having the name which he bears, than any supposed exterior or interior affinities between them.

Travellers and naturalists have almost unanimously declared this animal has the faculty of discharging its quills, and with such force as to wound its foes at a great distance; and that these prickly quills have the extraordinary property of penetrating farther into the flesh of their own accord and power, as soon as the point has made an entrance. This last circumstance is purely imaginary, without any foundation, and the first is as false as the second. The error seems to have arisen from this animal raising his prickles upright when he is irritated; and as some of them are only inserted into the skin by a small pellicle they easily fall off. We have had many living porcupines, but never saw them dart any of their quills, even though violently agitated. It is a matter of astonishment, therefore, that the gravest authors, both ancient and modern, as well as the most sensible travellers, should join in opinion respecting a circumstance so entirely false. Some affirm that they have been wounded by this sort of darting; others, assert that the quills are darted with such vengeance, as to pierce a plank at a great distance. The marvellous commonly is pleasingly believed, and increases in proportion to the number of hands it passes through. Truth, on the contrary, diminishes in the same degree; and in spite of the positive negative which I have placed on these two fictions, I am persuaded, that many future writers will assert that the porcupine darts his quills to a distance, and that when those quills are separated from the body of the animal, they will of themselves, and with their own exertions, penetrate deeper into those bodies in which the point has entered.

However, in justice to Dr. Shaw, we must except him from the number of these credulous travellers; "Of all the number of porcupines (says he) which I have seen in Africa, I have never yet met with one, who could dart their quills, however strongly he was irritated; their common method of defence is to lie on one side, and when the enemy approaches very near, to rise suddenly and wound him with the points of the other."

The porcupine, although originally a native of the hottest climates of Africa and India, lives and multiplies in colder countries, such as Persia, Spain, and Italy. Agricola says, that the porcupine had not been transported into Europe, much before his time. They are found in Spain, but more commonly in Italy, especially on the Appenine mountains, in the environs of Rome.

Pliny, and other naturalists, have said, after Aristotle, that the porcupine, like the bear, conceals himself during winter, and that they bring forth in thirty days. We have not had it in our power to verify these facts; and it is singular, that in Italy where this animal is common, and where there has ever been skilful philosophers and excellent observers of nature, that its history has never been written by any of them. Aldrovandus in speaking on this subject, has, like the rest, only copied Gesner; and the gentlemen of the academy, who have dissected eight of these animals, say very little that has any relation to their natural habits. We only learn from the testimonies of travellers, and persons who have kept them in menageries, that the porcupine in its domestic state, is neither savage nor furious, but only anxious for liberty; that with the assistance of its fore teeth, which are sharp and strong like those of the beaver, he easily cuts through his wooden prison. It is also known that he feeds willingly on fruits, cheese, and crumbs of bread; that in his wild state, he lives upon roots and wild grain; that when he can enter a garden he makes great havock[AG], eating the herbs, roots, fruit, &c. that he becomes fat, like most other animals, toward the end of summer; and that the flesh of this animal, although a little insipid, is tolerable eating.

[AG] The porcupine is a perfect scourge to the gardens of the Cape of Good Hope; he commits great ravages in the plantations of cabbage, and other kitchen herbs. The wild herb of which this animal is most fond, is the _Calla Ethiopica_, which however, is so acrid, according to Sparrman, that the root or the leaves applied to any part of the body will raise a blister.

When the form, substance, and organization of the prickles of the porcupine are considered, they are found to be tubes to which only vanes are wanting to make them real feathers. They strike together and make a noise as the animal walks; he can easily erect them in the same manner as the peacock spreads the feathers of his tail, and as easily smooths them again by the contraction of the cuticular muscle. This muscle, therefore, has the same power, and is nearly of the same formation in the porcupine as in some birds.

THE COENDOU.

In every article we have to treat of we always meet with more errors to confute than facts to relate. This arises from the history of animals having been only written of late by prejudiced persons, who take the list of their little systems for the genuine register of Nature. There are not any animals of the warm climates of the old continent existing in America, and reciprocally there are not any of the South American animals to be met with under the torrid zone of Africa and Asia. The porcupine, as already observed, is a native of the hot countries of the old world, and having never been found in the new, they have not hesitated to give his name to animals which seemed to resemble him, and particularly to that which we have now under consideration. On the other hand, the Coendou (_fig. 163._) of America has been transported to the East Indies; and Piso, who probably was not acquainted with the porcupine, has made Bontius, who only speaks of animals in the southern parts of Asia, engrave the coendou of America under the name and description of the true porcupine; so that, at the first view, we should firmly believe, that this animal existed equally in America and in Asia. It is easy, however, to discover, with a little attention, that Piso, who is in this, as well as in most parts of his work, only a plagiarist of Marcgrave, has not only copied his figure of the coendou, into his history of Brasil, but has copied it again for the work of Bontius, of which he was the editor. Therefore, though we find the figure of the coendou in Bontius, we must not conclude, that it exists in Java, or in any other part of the East Indies, nor take this figure for that of the porcupine, which, in fact, the coendou only resembles by its quills or prickles.

It is to Ximenes, and afterwards to Hernandes, that we owe the first knowledge of this animal, which they have indicated under the Mexican name of _hoitztlacuatzin_. The _tlacuatzin_ is the opossum and the _hoitztlacuatzin_ should be translated the _bristly_ or _spinous opossum_. This name has been misapplied, for these animals resemble each other very little. Marcgrave has not adopted this Mexican denomination, but calls this animal _cuandu_. The only thing we can reproach Marcgrave with, is his not having known, that the cuandu of Brasil was the same animal as the hoitztlacuatzin of Mexico, especially as his description and figure agree with those of Hernandes; and as Laët, the editor and commentator of Marcgrave expressly says, that the spiny tlacuatzin of Ximenes, and the cuandu, are probably the same animal. By collecting the scattered accounts of travellers there appears to be two varieties of these animals, which the naturalists, after Piso, have inserted in their lists as two different species, namely, the great and the little coendou: but what immediately proves the error, or negligence of Piso, is, that although he describes these coendous in two separate and distinct articles, and seems to look on them as different species, he represents both by the same figure: which, we think, sufficient foundation to pronounce them the same animal. There are likewise other naturalists who have not only made two species of the great and little coendou but have also separated the hoitztlacuatzin, and given all three as different animals. I own, indeed, that although it is probable, the coendou and the hoitztlacuatzin are the same animal, yet this identity is not so certain as that of the great and little coendou.

However that may be, the coendou is not the porcupine. He is much smaller; his head and muzzle shorter; he has no tuft on its head nor is his upper lip divided; his quills are proportionally shorter and much finer; his tail is long, and that of the porcupine very short: he is carnivorous rather than frugivorous, and endeavours to surprize birds, small animals, and poultry, while the porcupine only feeds upon herbs, roots, and fruits. He sleeps all the day like the hedge-hog, and only stirs out in the night: he climbs up trees, and hangs on branches by his tail. All travellers agree, that his flesh is very good eating. He is easily tamed, and commonly lives in high places. These animals are found over all America, from Brasil and Guiana, to Louisiana and the southern parts of Canada; while the porcupine is only to be found in the hottest parts of the Old Continent.

By conferring the name of porcupine on the coendou, the same faculties have been attributed to him, especially that of shooting his quills. It is astonishing that naturalists and travellers should agree on this circumstance, and that Piso, who ought to have been less superstitious, as he was a physician, should gravely assert, that the quills of the coendou pierce into the flesh by their own power, and penetrate into the body even to the most internal viscera. Ray is the only person who has denied these circumstances, although they evidently appear to be absurd. How many absurdities have been exposed by men of sense, which, nevertheless, are affirmed by other men who think they are endowed with a greater degree of understanding!

SUPPLEMENT.

To our former account of this animal we may now add that there are two species of it in Guiana, the one larger than the other; the former weigh from twelve to fifteen pounds, and the latter about six: their principal food is the leaves of trees, in the holes of which the females bring forth their young; they commonly bring forth two at a time, and yet they are not very numerous. The negroes are very fond of their flesh and describe it as extremely good. From the account of M. de la Borde they are solitary animals, except in the season of love, when they go in pairs; they seldom venture to appear during the day, and they find a most inveterate enemy in the tiger who destroys them at every opportunity.

THE URSON.

This animal has never yet received a distinct name: placed by Nature in the desert part of North America, it exists in independence far distant from man, and has not even received from him a name, which is the first mark of an animal's subjection. Hudson having discovered the country where he inhabits, we shall give him a name which has an affinity with his first master, and which, at the same time, indicates his sharp bristly nature. It was likewise necessary to give him a name, that he might not be confounded with the porcupine or coendou, which he resembles in some few characters, but so materially differs from them in other respects that he ought to be looked upon as a different species. He is also a native of the northern climates, while the others particularly belong to that of the south.

Edward, Ellis, and Catesby, have all spoken of this animal: the figures given by the two first agree with ours, and we have no doubt of their being the same animal. We are likewise strongly inclined to believe, that the figure and description Seba has given, under the name of _the remarkable porcupine of the East Indies_, and which afterwards Klein, Brisson, and Linnæus, indicated in their methodical lists by characters extracted from Seba, may be the same animal as we are now treating of. This would not, as we have already observed, be the only time that Seba has spoken of American animals as belonging to the East Indies. However we cannot be so positive with respect to this as we have been with many other animals; all that we can say is, that the resemblances appear to be very great, and the differences very slight, and that these differences may possibly be only varieties between individuals, or such as distinguish the males from the females.