The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 575, November 10, 1832Various
History
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 575, November 10, 1832
Various
Popular literature -- Great Britain -- Periodicals
I read with much pleasure the article in your Number, 574, on Nutria
Fur: it was, to me, particularly acceptable, as I have been connected
for the last ten years with an establishment where, on an average,
150,000 Nutria Skins are annually manufactured, and the wool cut for
the use of hatters. I have searched every book of travels in Brazil,
&c., that I could procure, and the chief English works on zoology,
without being able to gather any description of the scientific name or
habits of the animal. All the information I could collect was from the
captains of various vessels that had visited Buenos Ayres, and brought
cargoes of skins; but their accounts were extremely vague and
unsatisfactory.
I perceive, however, that you have overlooked a peculiarity generally
attributed to the animal, which, if true, is, in my opinion, deserving
notice: viz.--the position of the female's teats, which are not placed
on the belly, as with most animals, but on the side, approaching to
the back, by which means it is enabled to suckle its young on both
sides at once, whilst swimming on the surface of the water; and it
presents, I have understood, a singular group to the observant
traveller.
I have sent the skin of a female Nutria herewith, for your inspection,
as regards the teats, &c. (from which the fur has been cut by
machinery,) with a small sample of the belly fur, prepared for the
covering of a hat; the wholesale price of the latter is now three
guineas per lb.: it is used as a substitute for beaver-wool on
second-rate hats. Our French correspondents term the skins
"Ratgondin."
BENJAMIN NORRIS, JUN.
_Windsor Place, Southwark Bridge Road._
*** We thank our intelligent correspondent for this communication, as
well as for the skin and fur. The skin is rather above the usual size:
its length is 26 inches, the tail being cut off; as is always done
before the skins are exported: the width of the skin is 15 inches; the
teats, nine in number, are in two rows, each row being about 2-1/2
inches from the centre of the back, and about 5 inches from the centre
of the belly; so that they are, as our correspondent observes, _on the
side_, approaching to the back nearer by half than to the belly. This
position of the teats appears to correspond with the animal's habit of
suckling its young whilst swimming.
* * * * *
THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.
* * * * *
THE CHOLERA MOUNT.
_Lines on the Burying-Place for Patients who have Died of Cholera; a
pleasant eminence in Sheffield Park._
_By James Montgomery, Esq._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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