OCR Text |
Show 1881.] MISS A. CRANE ON THE MANATEE. 459 was invariably turned under and applied to the floor. With the present pair a horizontal (and not incurved) position is habitual, and the body when resting on the ground is supported by the under surface of the caudal fin. In connection, however, with this difference of attitude, it may be noted that the previous specimens had both received some injury to one of the fore paddles, which may possibly have affected the balancing-power of the body, as well as the facility for upward respiratory movements, and thus have remotely influenced the posture adopted by them. During life the right fore paddle of the first Brighton female hung motionless to its side. After death it was apparent that the spine had received injury, that one of the arm-bones (the humerus) was shattered, and that reparative processes had commenced. This was a very youthful individual; for the bones were mere cartilage, and no vestiges of the transverse processes of the caudal vertebrae, so characteristic of the adult skeleton, were developed. This animal in life measured 3 feet 8| inches ; and the whole skeleton weighed only three pounds and a half. It is probable, therefore, that the incurved posture may be only adopted by injured and enfeebled animals, as facilitating aerial respiration. Neither of the pair under notice assumed it in health, the female making but a faint approach to it a few days before her death, after seven months' life in captivity. Then, and then only, her body became somewhat contracted, and the enfeebled creature supported herself on the edge of her tail-fin, and remained with her head always close to the surface of the water. Lettuces and endives formed the favourite food of the pair, six dozen, weighing thirty pounds, being their average daily allowance. The male would devour at a pinch leaves of the cabbage, turnip, and carrot. Both relished those of the dandelion and the sow-thistle (Sonchus oleraceus). Some varieties of a common river-weed were also taken; but this food was abandoned on account of the leeches with which it was found to be infested. Sometimes the animals swim gently about and pursue the leaves floating on the water. At others the plants are seized in their mouths, drawn down and eaten under water, the hand-like fore fins being employed in separating the leaves. The food is invariably swallowed below the surface. The masticatory actions of the animal have been so fully and accurately described by Professor A. H. Garrod, F.R.S.1, that further remark on that subject is unnecessary. The habits of the animals in captivity, while affording occasional evidence of the ease and rapidity with which they move in the water, do not furnish much support to the views of their capability of habitual active progression on land. Yet it must be admitted that, supplied with a sufficiency of nicely varied food, they have no inducement to leave the water, and that the construction of their straight-walled tank precludes such efforts as a rule. The male, however, has recently been observed to make some slight attempts at terrestrial movement, turning himself round and progressing a few inches when his tank 1 Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. x. p. 137. 30* |