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第4章 衍生灵气（小爆发一下，六更完）

important; and it is to this unique and unexampled structure that the Elephant owes whatever superiority he possesses over other beasts. In general capacity he is inferior to most, and the intellectual qualities of a dog or a horse are unquestionably of a far more elevated order; but with the assistance of this curious organ, with some little sagacity, a tolerable memory, and a certain degree of docility, the Elephant is enabled to execute such a variety of actions, either of his own accord or at the command of his keeper, as have gained him the credit not only of being the cleverest of brutes, but of possessing qualities of a superior cast and even the divine gift of reason itself.

The Lion, like all the other cats (the genus to which, in a natural arrangement, he obviously belongs) is armed in each jaw with six strong and exceedingly sharp cutting-teeth, with two formidable canine, and with six others, three on each side, occupying the places of the molar or grinding-teeth, but terminating in sharp protuberances to assist in the laceration of the animal food, which is the proper nutriment of his tribe. Besides[3] these, he has, on each side of the upper jaw, a small tooth, or rather tubercle, placed immediately behind the rest. His tongue is covered with innumerable rough and elevated papill?, the points of which are directed backwards: these also assist in comminuting his food, and not unfrequently leave their traces on the hand which has been offered him to lick. His claws, five in number on the fore feet, and four on the hind, are of great length, extremely hard, and much curved; they are retractile within a sheath enclosed in the skin which covers the extremity of his paws; and as

The animals at present in the Tower, the only individuals of this species that have been brought alive to Europe, were presented about four years since by the Hudson’s Bay Company, by some of whose hunters they had been trapped in the northern regions of America. A fine skin of the same species was brought home by the late overland expedition to those countries, under the command of Captain Franklin, and presented to the Museum of the Zoological Society. There is also another instance of its occurrence recorded in the capture of a solitary specimen, in the Missouri territory, by the party engaged in Major Long’s expedition from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains. This specimen was accurately described, in the notes to the published narrative of that expedition, by Mr. Say, who at once recognised it as a[96] distinct species, and affixed to it the scientific name which we have adopted without hesitation for these animals, with the most striking peculiarities of which his description coincides in every essential

With the exception of the Opossums, which are natives of America, the tribe is peculiar to New Holland and its[157] appendages, and to some of the islands which form the great chain of connexion between that insular continent and South-eastern Asia. The former is, however, their head quarters, and the species which are found beyond its limits are few in number compared with those which people its territory, and, what is more remarkable, people it to the exclusion of nearly all the other Mammalia; the dog alone, the universal concomitant of man, and one or two species of rats, disputing with them their title to its exclusive possession; for those paradoxical creatures, the Ornithorhynchus and Echidna, if really mammiferous, approximate closely in structure to the Marsupial tribe.

Strix Virginiana. Linn.

f gratitude, have been proved by repeated experience to be utterly false and groundless. He is tamed with as much facility, and as completely, as the Lion; and soon becomes familiarised with those who feed him, whom he learns to distinguish from others, and by whom he is fond of being noticed and caressed. Like the cat, which he resembles so closely in all his actions, he arches his broad and powerful back beneath the hand that caresses him; he licks his fur and smooths himself with his paws; and purrs in the same mild and expressive manner when he is particularly pleased. He[32] remains perfectly quiet and undisturbed, unless when hungry or irritated, and passes the greater part of his time in listless repose. His roar is nearly similar to that of the Lion, and, like his, is by no means to be regarded as a symptom of anger, which he announces by a short and shrill cry, approaching to a scream.

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ts, and approximates them in several respects to the Pachydermatous order, with which, in spite of their many discrepancies, both physical and moral, M. Cuvier has associated them. It is needless to point out the incongruity of this union, and it would be equally so to say more of the general form and external characteristics of a group, the principal species of which are so constantly before our eyes.

The animals of the part of New Holland from which these birds are derived appear in general to suffer little from their transportation to the climate of England. The Emeus, like the Kanguroos, have become to a certain extent naturalized in the Royal Park at Windsor, where they breed without difficulty and with no extraordinary precautions. Here they have assigned to them a sufficient space of ground to take ample exercise; and this circumstance contributes not a little to the thriving condition in which they are met with. They are perfectly harmless unless when irritated or pursued, in which case they sometimes strike very severe blows with their beaks, which are extremely hard. The pair in the Tower were obtained from this establishment, where they were bred.