William Henry Flower and Richard Lydekker

“ In North America there is a second distinct smaller species, called the coyote or prairie-wolf (Canis latrans) , and perhaps the Japanese wolf (C. hodophylax) may be distinct, although, except for its smaller size and shorter legs, it is scarcely distinguishable from the common species. The wolf enters the N.W. corner of India, but in the peninsula is replaced by the more jackal-like C. pallipes, which is probably a member of the jackal group, and not a wolf at all.
The ordinary colour of the wolf is yellowish or fulvous grey, but almost pure white and entirely black wolves are known. ”

“ Although by their mode of life far removed from close observation, whales are in many respects the most interesting and wonderful of all creatures; and there is much in their structure and habits worthy of study. One of the first lessons a study of these animals affords is that, in the endeavour to discover what a creature really is, from what others it is descended, and to which it is related, the outward appearance affords little clue, and we must go deep below the surface to find the essential characteristics of its nature. There was once, and may be still, an idea that a whale is a fish. ”

“ Synetheres, or Coendu, contains some eight or ten species, known as tree-porcupines, found throughout tropical South America, with one extending into Mexico. They are of a lighter build than the ground-porcupines, with short, close, many-coloured spines, often mixed with hairs, and prehensile tails. The hind-feet have only four toes, owing to the suppression of the first, in place of which they have a fleshy pad on the inner side of the foot, between which and the toes boughs and other objects can be firmly grasped as with a hand. ”

“ The outsides of the ears have a white tip and a broad black mark occupying the greater part of the surface, but are white at the base. Perhaps the most constant and obvious distinction between this species and the next is the arrangement of the stripes on the hinder part of the back, where there are a number of short transverse bands reaching to the median longitudinal dorsal stripe, and unconnected with the uppermost of the broad stripes which pass obliquely across the haunch from the flanks towards the root of the tail. ”

“ The female produces three to five young ones in March or April, and brings them up in a nest formed of grass or other herbage, usually placed in a hollow place in the bank of a river, or under the shelter of the roots of some overhanging tree. The otter is found in localities suitable to its habits throughout Great Britain and Ireland, though less abundantly than formerly, for, being destructive to fish, it is rarely allowed to live in peace when its haunts are discovered. ”

“ It is singular that such closely allied species as the domestic dog and the Arctic fox are among the favourite prey of wolves, and, as is well known, children and even full-grown people are not infrequently the objects of their attack when pressed by hunger. ”

“ In the North Pacific a similar if not identical whale is regularly hunted by the Japanese, who tow the carcases ashore for the purpose of flensing and extracting the whalebone. In the tropical seas, however, right whales are never or rarely seen; but the southern temperate ocean, especially in the neighbourhood of the Cape of Good Hope, Kerguelen’s Island, Australia and New Zealand, is inhabited by “black whales,” once abundant, but now nearly exterminated through the wanton destruction of the females as they visit the bays and inlets round the coast, their constant habit in the breeding time. ”

“ The variations which have been perpetuated and intensified by artificial selection are, with the exception of those of the dog, greater than have been induced in any other mammal. For not only has the weight been more than quadrupled in some of the larger breeds, and the structure of the skull and other parts of the skeleton greatly altered, but the proportionate size of the brain has been reduced and the colour and texture of the fur altered in a remarkable manner. ”

“ The entire length of the animal from nose to end of tail is about 4 ft., so that the body is considerably larger and more massive than that of the English otter. The skin is peculiarly loose, and stretches when removed from the animal. The fur is remarkable for the preponderance of the beautifully soft woolly under-fur, the longer stifier hairs being scanty. ”

“ This species is stationary all the year round, but some have a regular season of migration, moving south in winter and north in summer. They are usually harmless, timid, inoffensive animals, though, being polygamous, the old males often fight desperately with each other, their skins being frequently found covered with wounds and scars. They are greatly attached to their young, and remarkably docile and easily trained when in captivity; indeed there is perhaps no wild animal which attaches itself so readily to the person by whom it is cared for and fed. ”

“ From the greater value of the fur, silver greys have been frequently employed to stock warrens, as they breed true to colour in the open if the ordinary wild rabbits are excluded. Other colours known, as silver fawn and silver brown, are closely related. A blue breed has been recently introduced. The largest and heaviest of all is the Flemish giant, with iron-grey fur above and white below. Other breeds include the Japanese, with an orange coat, broadly banded on the hind-quarters with black ”

“ Excluding some varieties of domestic dogs, wolves are the largest members of the genus, and have a wide geographical range, extending over nearly the whole of Europe and Asia, and North America from Greenland to Mexico, but are not found in South America or Africa, where they are replaced by other members of the family. ”

“ As soon as they begin to require other food than her milk, she kills for them, teaching them to do so for themselves by practising on small animals, such as deer and young calves or pigs. At these times she is wanton and extravagant in her cruelty, killing apparently for the gratification of her ferocious and bloodthirsty nature, and perhaps to excite and instruct the young ones, and it is not until they are thoroughly capable of killing their own food that she separates from them. The young tigers are far more destructive than the old. ”

“ At times, and not unfrequently, a troop may be heard, roaring in concert, one assuming the lead, and two, three or four more regularly taking up their parts, like persons singing a catch. Like our Scottish stags at the rutting season, they roar loudest in cold frosty nights ”

“ All the American species are of a nearly uniform dark brown or blackish colour when adult; but it is a curious circumstance that when young (and in this the Malay species conforms with the others) they are conspicuously marked with spots and longitudinal stripes of white or fawn colour on a darker ground.
In habits all tapirs appear to be very similar. They are solitary, nocturnal, shy and inoffensive, chiefly frequenting the depths of shady forests and the neighbourhood of water, to which they frequently resort for the purpose of bathing, and in which they often take refuge when pursued. ”

“ The number of young in each nest is generally five, sometimes only three occasionally seven or eight, and at least two broods are produced annually. Their food is entirely vegetable, especially grass roots and stalks, shoots of dwarf birch, reindeer lichens and mosses, in search of which they form, in winter, long galleries through the turf or under the snow. They are restless, courageous and pugnacious little animals. When suddenly disturbed, instead of trying to escape they sit upright, with their back against a stone, hissing and showing fight in a determined manner. ”

“ When the mouth is opened, their elasticity causes them to straighten out like a bow unbent, so that at whatever distance the jaws are separated the strainer remains in perfect action, filling the whole of the interval. The mechanical perfection of the arrangement is completed by the great development of the lower lip, which rises stiffly above the jaw-bone and prevents the long, slender, flexible ends of the whalebone from being carried outwards by the rush of water from the mouth, when its cavity is being diminished by the closure of the jaws and raising of the tongue. ”

“ Although seals swim and dive with the greatest ease, often remaining as much as a quarter of an hour or more below the surface, and are dependent for their sustenance entirely on living prey captured in the water, all the species frequently resort to sandy beaches, rocks or ice-floes, either to sleep or to bask in the sun, and especially for the purpose of bringing forth their young. The latter appears to be the universal habit, and the young seals—of some species at least—take to the water at first very reluctantly, and have to be taught to swim by their parents. ”

“ The bones of the skeleton generally more resemble those of the Indian elephant than of any other species, but the skull differs in the narrower summit, narrower temporal fossae, and more prolonged incisive sheaths, supporting the roots of the enormous tusks. Among the external characters by which the mammoth was distinguished from either of the existing species of elephant was the dense clothing, not only of long, coarse outer hair, but also of close under woolly hair of a reddish-brown colour, evidently in adaptation to the cold climate it inhabited. ”