 Chapter 39 of the Burgess Animal Book for Children. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Ava Harnick. The Burgess Animal Book for Children by Thornton W. Burgess. Chapter 39 Piggy and Heart Shell. The Bakery or Wild Pig and the Armadillo. All the way to school the next morning, Peter Rabbit did his best to guess who it might be that they were to learn about that day. Old Mother Nature said that he is related to someone who lives in Farmer Brown's barnyard, said Peter to himself. Now, who can it be? But try as he would, Peter couldn't think of anyone. He asked Jumper the head if he had guessed who it could be. Jumper shook his head. I haven't the least idea, said he. You know, I seldom leave the green forest and I never have been over to that barnyard in my life, so of course I don't know who lives there. Danny Meadow Mouse and Whitefoot, the Wood Mouse, were no wiser, nor was Johnny Chuck. But Chatterer, the Red Squirrel, it was plain to see. Was quite sure he knew who it was. Chatterer had been over to Farmer Brown so often to steal corn from the corn crib that he knew all about that barnyard and who lived there. But though Peter and the others teased him to tell them, he wouldn't. So when Old Mother Nature asked who had guessed to whom she had referred, Chatterer was the only one to reply. I think you must have meant the pig, who is always rooting about, and grunting in that barnyard, said he. Your guess is right, Chatterer, she replied, smiling at the little red-coated rascal. And this morning I will tell you a little about the relative of his who doesn't live in a barnyard but lives in the forest as free and independent as you are. It is Piggy, the Peccary, known as the Coloured Peccary, also called Wild Pig, Muskog, Texas Peccary, and Javelina. He is a true pig, and in shape resembles that lazy fat fellow in Farmer Brown's barnyard when he was little. You would know him for a pig right away, if you should see him. But in every other way, accepting his habit of rooting up the ground with his nose, he is a wholly different fellow. For one thing his legs, though short, are more slender, and he is a fast runner. There isn't a lazy bone in him, and he is too active to grow fat. His head is large, and his nose long, and his tail is almost no tail at all. It is just a little rounded knob, as if he had at one time had a tail, and it had been cut off. His hair is coarse and stiff, the kind of hair called bristles. From the back of his head along his back the bristles are long and stout. They are black at the tips, so that he appears to have a black back. When Piggy is angry he raises these long bristles so that they stand straight up, and this gives him a very fierce appearance. His color is so dark gray that at a distance he appears black. Indeed he is black on many parts of him. Just back of the neck a whitish band crosses the shoulders, and this is why he is called the colored peccary. You see, he seems to be wearing a color. On each jaw are two great pointed teeth called tusks. The two upper ones so long that they project beyond the lips. These tusks are Piggy's weapons, and very good ones they are. The home of Piggy the Peccary is in the hot south-western part of this country, where live Jaguar and Ocelot, the beautiful spotted members of the cat family. They are two of his enemies. He never likes to be alone, but lives with a band of his friends and they roam about together. He is found on the plains and among low hills, in swamps and dense forests, and among the sickets of cactus and other thorny plants that grow in dry regions. Plenty of food and shelter from the hot sun seem to be the main thing with Piggy. What does he eat? asked Peter Rabbit. Old Mother Nature laughed. It would be easier, Peter, to tell you what he doesn't eat, said she. He eats everything eatable, nuts, fruits, seeds, roots and plants of various kinds, insects, frogs, lizards, snakes and any small animals he can catch. Sometimes he does great damage to gardens and crops planted by men. He delights to root in the earth with his nose and often turns over much ground in this way, searching for roots good to eat. On the lower part of his back he carries a little bag of musky scent, and from this he gets the name of Muskhog. While as a rule he wisely runs from danger, he is no coward and will fight fiercely when cornered. His friends at once rush to help him and surround the enemy, who is usually glad to climb a tree to escape their gnashing tusks. However, he is not the fierce animal he has been reported to be ready to attack unprovoked. He will run away if he can. Mr. and Mrs. Peccary have two babies at a time. This is the last of the hoofed animals and the last but one of the land animals of this great country, so you see we are almost to the end of school. This last one is perhaps the queerest of all. It is heart shell the armadillo and belongs to the order of Ed and Tata, which means toothless. Do you mean to say that there are animals with no teeth at all, as happy Jack Squirrel looking as if he couldn't believe such a thing? Old Mother Nature nodded. That is just what I mean, said she. There are animals without any teeth though not in this country and others with so few teeth that they have been put in the same order with the holy toothless ones. Heart shell the armadillo is one of these. He has no teeth at all in the front of his mouth and such teeth as he has got do not amount too much. But why do you call him heart shell? Asked Peter impatiently. Because instead of a coat of fur he wears a coat of shell, replied Old Mother Nature and then laughed right out at the funny expressions on the faces before her. It was quite clear that Peter and his friends were having hard work to believe. She was in earnest. They suspected her of joking. Do you mean that he lives in a sort of house that he carries with him like spotty the turtle? When should Peter? It is a shell but not like that of spotting, explained Old Mother Nature. Spotty's shell is all one piece, but armadillo's shell is jointed so that he can roll up like a ball. Spotty isn't a mammal as are all of you and all those we have been learning about, but is a reptile. Heart shell the armadillo on the other hand is a true mammal. Well, all I can say is that he must be a mighty queer looking fella, declared Peter. He is, replied Old Mother Nature. He's about the size of Uncle Billy Possum and if you can imagine a pig of about that size with very short legs, a long tapering tail, feet with toes and long claws and the shell covering his whole body, the front of his face and even his tail, you will have something of an idea what he looks like. He lives down in the hot south west where Piggy the Packery lives. His coat of shell is yellowish in color and is divided in the middle of his body into nine narrow bands or joints. Because of this he's called the nine-banded armadillo. In the countries to the south of this he has a cousin with three bands and another with six. Heart shell's head is very long and he carries it pointed straight down. His small eyes are set far back and at the top of his head are rather large upright ears. The shell of his tail is divided into many jointed rings so that he can move it at will. His tongue is long and sticky. This is so that he can run it out for some distance and sweep up the ends and insects on which he largely lives. His eyesight and hearing are not very good and having such a heavy stiff coat he is a poor runner. But he is a good digger. This means, of course, that he makes his home in a hole in the ground. When frightened he makes for this but if overtaken by an enemy he rolls up into a ball and is safe from all, save those with big and strong enough teeth to break through the joints of his shell. He eats some vegetable matter and is accused of eating the eggs of ground-nesting birds and of dead decayed flesh he may find. However, his food consists chiefly of ants, insects of various kinds and worms. He is a harmless little fellow and interesting because he is so queer. He is sometimes killed and eaten by men and his flesh is considered very good. He has from four to eight babies in the early spring. The baby armadillo has a soft tough skin instead of a shell and as it grows it hardens until by the time it is fully grown it has become a shell. Now this finishes the lessons about the land animals or mammals. There are other mammals who live in the ocean which is the salt water which surrounds the land and which I guess none of you have ever seen. Some of these come on shore and some never do. Tomorrow I will tell you just a little about them so that you will know something about all the animals of this great country which is called North America. That is, I will if you want me to. We do, of course we do, cried Peter Rabbit and it is plain that he spoke for all. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Burgess Animal Book for Children by Thornton W. Burgess Chapter 40 The Mammals of the Sea The sea otter, walrus, sea lions, seals, and manatee, or sea cow. It was the last day of Old Mother Nature's school in the green forest and when jolly, round, bright Mr. Sun had climbed high enough in the blue, blue sky to peep down through the trees, he found not one missing of the little people who had been learning so much about themselves, their relatives, neighbors, and all the other animals in every part of this great country. You see, not for anything in the world would one of them willingly have missed that last lesson. I told you yesterday, began Old Mother Nature, that the land is surrounded by water, salt water, sometimes called the ocean, and sometimes the sea. In this live the largest animals in all the great world, and many others, some of which sometimes come on land, and others which never do. One of those which come on land is first cousin to little Joe Otter, and is named the sea otter. He lives in the cold waters of the western ocean far north. He much resembles little Joe Otter, whom you all know, but has finer, handsomer fur. In fact, so handsome is his fur that he has been hunted for it until now. He is among the shyest and rarest of all animals, and has taken to living in the water practically all the time, rarely visiting land. He lies on his back in the water and gets his food from the bottom of the sea. It is chiefly clams and other shellfish. He rests on floating masses of sea plants. He is very playful and delights to toss pieces of seaweed from paw to paw as he lies floating on his back. Of course he is a wonderful swimmer and diver, otherwise he couldn't live in the sea. Another who comes on land but only for a very short distance from the water is called the walrus. He belongs to an order called finipedia, which means thin-footed. Instead of having legs and feet for walking, members of this order have limbs designed for swimming. These are more like fins or paddles at anything else and are called flippers. The walrus is so big that I can give you no idea how big he is, accepting to say that he will weigh two thousand pounds. He is simply a great mass of living flesh covered with a rough, very thick skin without hair. From his upper jaw two immense ivory tusks hang straight down and with these he digs up shellfish at the bottom of the sea. It is a terrible effort for him to move on shore and so he is content to stay within a few feet of the water. He also lives in the cold waters of the far north amidst floating ice. On this he often climbs out to lie for hours. His voice is a deep grunt or bellowing roar. The young are born on land close to the water. The sea lions belong to the same thin-footed order. The best known of these are the California sea lion and the fur seal, which is not a true seal. The California sea lion is also called the Barking sea lion because of its habit of barking and is the best known of the family. It is frequently seen on the rocks along the shore and on the islands off the western coast. These sea lions are sleek animals, exceedingly graceful in the water. They have long necks and carry their heads high. They are covered with short coarse hair and have small, sharp-pointed ears. Their front flippers have neither hair nor claws, but their hind flippers have webbed toes. They are able to move about on land surprisingly well for animals lacking regular legs and feet and can climb on and over rocks rapidly. Naturally, they are splendid swimmers. The largest member of the family is the stellar sea lion, who sometimes grows to be almost as big as a walrus. He is not sleek and graceful like his smaller cousin, but has an enormously thick neck and heavy shoulders. His voice is a roar rather than a bark. The head of an old sea lion is so much like that of a true lion that the name sea lion has been given this family. The most valuable member of the family, so far as man is concerned, is the fur seal, also called sea bear. It is very nearly the size and form of the California sea lion, but under the coarse outer hair, which is gray in color, is a wonderful, soft, fine, brown fur, and for this the fur seal has been hunted so persistently that there was real danger that soon the very last one would be killed. Now wise and needed laws protect the fur seals on their breeding grounds, which are certain islands in the far north. The young of all members of this family are born on shore, but soon take to the water. The fur seal migrates just as the birds do, but always returns to the place of its birth. Man and the polar bear are its enemies on land and ice, and the killer whale in the water. Mr. Fur Seal always has many wives, and this is true of the other members of the sea lion family and of the walrus. The males are three or four times the size of the females. Among themselves the males are fierce fighters. The true seals are short-necked, thick-bodied, and have rather round heads with no visible ears. The walrus and sea lions can turn their hind flippers forward to use as feet on land, but this the true seals cannot do. Therefore they are more clumsy out of water. Their front flippers are covered with hair. The one best known is the harbour or leopard seal. It is found along both coasts, often swimming far up big rivers. It is one of the smallest members of the family. Sometimes it is yellowish grey, spotted with black, and sometimes dark brown with light spots. The ringed seal is about the same size or a little smaller than the harbour seal, and is found as far north as it can find breathing holes in the ice. You know all these animals breathe air, just as land animals do. This seal looks much like the harbour seal, but is a little more slender. Another member of the family is the harp, saddleback, or greenland seal. He is larger than the other two and has a black head and grey body with a large black ring on the back. The female is not so handsome, being merely spotted. The handsomest seal is the ribbon seal. He is about the size of his cousin the harbour seal. He is also called the harlequin seal. Sometimes his coat is blackish brown and sometimes yellowish grey, but always he has a band of yellowish white like a broad ribbon from his throat around over the top of his head, and another band, which starts on his chest and goes over his shoulder, curves down, and finally goes around his body, not far above the hind flippers. Only the male is so marked. This seal is rather rare, like most of the others it lives in the cold waters of the far north. The largest of the seals is the elephant seal, once numerous, but killed by man until now there are few members of this branch of the family. He is a tremendous fellow and has a movable nose being several inches below his mouth. The queerest looking member of the family is the hooded seal. Mr. Seal of this branch of the family is rather large and on top of his nose he carries a large bag of skin which he can fill with air until he looks as if he were wearing a queer hood or bonnet. The seals complete the list of animals which live mostly in the water but come out on land or ice at times. Now I will tell you what a warm mammal, warm-blooded, just as you are, and air-breathing but which never comes on land. This is the manatee or sea-cow. It lives in the warm waters of the sunny south coming up from the sea in the big rivers. It is a very large animal, sometimes growing as big as a medium-sized walrus. The head is round, somewhat like that of a seal. The lips are thick and big. The upper one split in the middle. The eyes are small. It has but two flippers and these are set in at the shoulders. Instead of hind flippers such as the seals and sea lions have the manatee has a broad, flattened and rounded tail which is used as a propeller just as fish use their tails. The neck is short and large. In the water the manatee looks black. The skin is almost hairless. This curious animal lives on water-plants. Sometimes it will come close to a river bank and with head and shoulders out of water feed on the grasses which hang down from the bank. The babies are, of course, born in the water, as the manatee never comes on shore. Now I think this will end today's lesson and the school. Peter Rabbit hopped up excitedly. You said that the largest animals in the world live in the sea and you haven't told us what they are. He cried. So enough, Peter, replied Old Mother Nature pleasantly. The largest living animal is a whale. A true mammal and not a fish at all as some people appear to think. There are several kinds of whales some of them comparatively small and some the largest animals in the world so large that I cannot give you any idea of how big they are. Beside one of these the biggest walrus would look like a baby. The whales do not belong just to this country so I think we will not include them. Now we will close the school. I hope you have enjoyed learning as much as I have enjoyed teaching and I hope that what you have learned will be of use to you as long as you live. The more knowledge you possess the better fitted for your part in the work of the great world you will be. Don't forget that and never miss a chance to learn. And so ended Old Mother Nature's school in the Green Forest. One by one her little pupils thanked her for all she had taught them and then started for home. Peter Rabbit was the last. I know ever and ever so much more than I did when I first came to you but I guess that after all I know very little of all there is to know he said shyly which shows that Peter Rabbit really had learned a great deal. Then he started for the dear old Briar Patch. Lippity, Lippity, Lip. End of Chapter 40. End of The Burgess Animal Book for Children by Thornton W. Burgess