The prairie appears to have heretofore extended, {95} almost without interruption, for several miles in the rear of St. Louis. The western portions of it are yet naked meadows, without trees or bushes. As we followed the little pathway towards Bon Homme,[51] we passed large tracts to which the labours of the sand rat[52] had given the aspect of a ploughed field. From the great quantities of fresh earth recently brought up, we perceived the little animals were engaged in enlarging their subterranean excavations; and we watched long, though in vain, expecting to see them emerge from their burrows. It is probable the jarring of the earth under the hoofs of our horses, by giving early notice of our approach, prevented them from appearing at the surface. [51] Bonhomme (Good Man) is the name of a creek, a township, and a post-office in St. Louis County, but has never been the name of a town. The post-office of Bonhomme is of comparatively recent origin, and even now contains but one store. The name as used in the text apparently applies collectively to the settlements along Bonhomme Creek.—ED. [52] Genus _Pseudostoma_.[53] SAY.—Cheek-pouches exterior to the mouth; incisores naked, truncated; molares sixteen, destitute of radicles; crown simple, oval; anterior ones double. Species, _Pseudostoma bursaria_.—Body sub-cylindrical, covered with reddish-brown hair, which is plumbeous at base; feet white, anterior nails elongated, posterior ones short, and concave beneath. _Mus bursarius_, (Shaw, Trans. Lin. Soc. Lond. and Genl. Zoology.)—_Body_ elongated, sub-cylindrical; _hair_ reddish-brown, plumbeous at base; _beneath_ rather paler; _cheek-pouches_ capacious, covered with hair both within and without; _vibrissæ_ numerous, slender, whitish; _eyes_ black; _ears_ hardly prominent; _feet_ five-toed, white, anterior pair robust, with large, elongated, somewhat compressed nails, exposing the bone on the inner side, middle nail much longest, then the fourth, then the second, then the fifth, the first being very short; posterior feet slender, nails concave beneath, rounded at tip, the exterior one very small; _tail_ short, hairy at base, nearly naked towards the tip. This animal is congeneric with the Tucan of Hernandez, which Buffon erroneously considers the same as the _Talpha rubra Americana_ of Seba, or _Talpha rubra_, Lin., an animal which is, however, entirely out of the question, and which, if we may be allowed to judge from Seba's figure, is so far from having any specific affinity with the _bursarius_, that it cannot now be regarded as co-ordinate with it.