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_ [Illustration: FIG. 162. _Porcupine._] [Illustration: FIG. 164. _Tendrac._ FIG. 163. _Coendou._] 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]