Several Kinds Of An Animal

It is less than a century siuce the European hunted the platypus to his lair, the first published account of him having appeared in the Naturalist's Miscellany of London in 1709. Itwould be interesting to know the effect that was made upon the flrst discovcrer of what Scribner's calis ananimated paradox - than which nature furnishes nothiug more anomalous, in its combination of duck-like mandibles and webbed feet, the latter further equipped with spurs like the game f owl and claws like the true burrowing quadrupeds, mole-like eyes and otter-like fur, body of musquash and tail of beaver. One who was addicted to his cups might recognize in the creature merely the figment of an alcoholized brain, and an artist regard him as the prototype of one of those uncanny monsters which sprawl upon the floor of St. Anthony's cave in Teniers' bizarre pictures of the temptation of that holy character. Our earliest and, in fact, almost our sole accounts of the platypús are confined to bald and literal descriptions of his appearance and habitat, from which we learn that he is confined to Tasmania and the southern districts of Australia; and although his race has been thought to embrace two or three species, it is now agreed to consistof only one. You may repair many times to the favorite haunt of the platypus before you see him, and to discover the retreat to which he modestly retires on observing your presence is a task impossible, except by accident, to any other than a black f ellow. To these cunning hunters, however, there are no secreta of beast or bird; their unerring instinct tells them when the platypus, diving near the edge of the stream, is in quest of food, or when he is seeking the submerged entrance to his burro w; and the will ad vise you either where to point your gun in expectation of the animal's reappearance, or where to dig in the bank in confidence of striking the grass-lined nest wherein he dwells and rears his remarkable family.