Fig. 128.—American Tapir. Tapirus terrestris. × 1⁄10.
The genus Tapirus is now met with only in South and Central America, and in the Malay Peninsula and the islands of Java and Sumatra. This animal is in many respects the most ancient of existing forms referable to the Perissodactyle order. It has four toes on the front-feet, though only three on the hind-feet. The number of teeth is 42—nearly the typical Eutherian number. The Tapirs are always moderately-sized animals, entirely covered with hair, and usually of a brownish-black colour. The Malayan Tapir is, however, banded broadly with white—a single band; the young of the Tapir is spotted, and striped with white. The nose and upper lip conjoined are produced into a short trunk, precisely comparable with that of the Elephant. As in the Rhinoceros—and in this both contrast with the other existing Perissodactyle genus Equus—the temporal fossa is not separated from the orbit by bone. Of existing Tapirs there are at any rate T. terrestris,[[156]] T. roulini (the "Tapir Pinchaque" of Cuvier), T. dowi and T. bairdi in America (the last two being sometimes separated into a distinct genus, Elasmognathus, on account of the prolongation of the ossified mesethmoid), and T. indicus in the East. The tapir, probably T. terrestris, is described by Buffon as "a dull and gloomy animal." It is certainly mainly nocturnal in habit. The name terrestris was given by Linnaeus, who placed it in the same genus as
Hippopotamus amphibius; hence the epithet applied to the Tapir. But as a matter of fact it loves marshy neighbourhoods, and is in a way amphibious. This does not of course apply to the Andesian T. roulini, which inhabits the cordillera of Ecuador and Colombia. The distribution of existing Tapirs is, as is so often the case, restricted when compared with that of their extinct congeners and allies. In Europe the remains of the genus Tapirus are abundant from Pliocene strata, and its remains are there known from as far back as the Miocene. The genus is thus one of the very oldest forms of Mammalia at present inhabiting the earth.
Fig. 129.—Malayan Tapir. Tapirus indicus, young. × 1⁄10. (From Nature.)
The Malayan Tapir is to be distinguished from the American (T. terrestris—the other species have not been dissected) by the greater development of the valvulae conniventes in the intestine, the absence of a moderator band in the heart, and the less elongated caecum, which is sacculated by only three bands, there being four in T. terrestris.[[157]] The animal frequents the most retired spots among the hill woods, by which habit it seems
largely to escape the Tiger, its most formidable foe in those regions of the world. Its quickness of senses enables it also to slip away with rapidity. It can proceed at a great pace when disturbed, and can readily push its way through obstacles. The young animal, like that of the American species, is dark brown with yellowish spots. It is stated by Mr. H. N. Ridley that the young animal lies during the hot part of the day under bushes, in which situation "its coat is so exactly like a patch of ground flecked with sunlight that it is quite invisible." It is interesting to note that here, as with some other animals, it is the young that are especially protected by such mechanisms. Moreover, some of the spots are round and some are more elongated, so that the resemblance to spots of sunlight which come in a direct and in a slanting direction is greatly increased. Even the colours of the adult are not so conspicuous when it is in its native haunts as might be supposed. The breaking up of the ground colour into tracts of two different colours prevent it from striking the eye so plainly as if it were of one colour throughout. "When lying down during the day it exactly resembles a grey boulder, and as it often lives near the rocky streams of the hill jungles, it is really nearly as invisible then as it was when it was speckled."[[158]]
Fam. 3. Rhinocerotidae.—This family is to be distinguished from the preceding by a number of characters, which though not universal are general. In the first place, there are commonly horns, or a horn, consisting of what appears to be an agglomeration of hair-like structures fixed upon a roughened patch of bone on the surface of the nasals. The incisors are diminished or defective, and the upper canines are often wanting. The molars and premolars are alike. The fore-feet are four- or three-toed, but are functionally tridactyle; the hind-feet are three-toed. The skeleton in this family is massive, and the limbs relatively short. The skull, as in the Tapirs, has a confluent orbit and temporal fossa. The upper lip is generally more or less prehensile; the body is as a rule—to which the Pleistocene Hairy Rhinoceros is of course an exception—rather sparsely covered with hair. In this feature the Rhinocerotidae contrast both with the Tapiridae and the Equidae. The family in reality contains but one existing genus, though three have been instituted, viz.