LITMIR.BIZ

      PIGGY THE COLLARED PECCARY. He is called Wild Pig and Muskhog.

      “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 excepting 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 a 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 Collared Peccary. You see he seems to be wearing a collar. 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 southwestern 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 thickets 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 things 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 man. 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 Hardshell the Armadillo, and belongs to the order of Edentata, which means toothless.”

      “Do you men to say that there are animals with no teeth at all?” asked 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 wholly toothless ones. Hardshell 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 to much.”