I refer here to the true llama or domesticated form of the genus Llama, of which the vicunha and huanaco are the existing wild species. In the stirring time when a handful of Spanish Conquistadores under Pizarro conquered and trampled upon the ancient civilisation of the Incas this useful animal was employed to an immense extent as a beast of burden. Lydekker says that at the time of the Conquest of Peru it was estimated that three hundred thousand llamas were employed in the mines of Potosi alone. Prescott gives an excellent account of the use of this animal in his _Conquest of Peru_. They were valued highly for their strength and sureness of foot which were much needed in their long and rugged journeys over the great passes of the Cordilleras, as well as for the excellence of their flesh. [Illustration: Fig. 47.--Fore foot of llama shown from behind (A) and from side (B) with whorls of hair and reversed areas on each side.] The only region of a llama’s body which is of interest in the present inquiry is the fore-foot, figured in Fig. 47. It presents a very remarkable arrangement of hair on its under surface, just above the double hoof and spongy pad at the joint above the hoof. This is found on each side towards the outer border of the hollow region, and consists of a whorl from which the hairs radiate in a reversed direction towards the upper part and transversely across the rest of the hollow. Prescott speaks of “its spongy hoof, armed with a claw or pointed talon to enable it to secure hold on the ice,” and adds that “it never requires to be shod.” If one reflects upon the ceaseless action during rough and slippery locomotion of this animal throughout its working life on mountain passes, on rough stony paths and ice-covered places, one can have no doubt of the reason why this particular joint, so greatly used in maintaining a foothold, should have acquired on this sheltered portion of its hair an animal pedometer. The Parti-coloured Bear--Æluropus Melanoleucus. This is a rare and peculiar form of the family of Ursidæ about which I made a statement some years ago at the Zoological Society of London. It is a “stocky” animal with a small head and broad short muzzle, a feature to which it has no right according to its affinities. It is not a member of the high-class Felidæ whose special prerogative it is to wear their hair on a short broad muzzle in a _downward_ direction as I showed in Chapter XI. Being a more _bourgeois_ creature than a cat it has offended against such sumptuary laws as may exist in the animal kingdom. Its hair ought to be worn in the proper backward or upward slope such as other bears, dogs and small carnivores display.