echidna

n.

a fossorial Monotreme, in generalappearance resembling a Porcupine, and often called SpinyAnt-eater or Porcupine, or PorcupineAnt-eater. The body is covered with thick fur from whichstiff spines protrude; the muzzle is in the form of a longtoothless beak; and the tongue is very long and extensile, andused largely for licking up ants; the feet are short, withstrong claws adapted for burrowing. Like the Marsupials, theEchidna is provided with a pouch, but the animal is oviparous,usually laying two eggs at a time, which are carried about inthe pouch until the young ones are hatched, when they are fedby a secretion from mammary glands, which do not, however, asin other mammals, open on to a nipple. The five-toed Echidnas(genus Echidna) are found in New Guinea, Australia, andTasmania, while the three-toed Echidnas (genus Proechidna) are confined to New Guinea. The speciesare – – Common E., Echidna aculeata, Shaw; Bruijn's E., Proechidna bruijni, Peters and Doria; Black-spined E., Proechidna nigro-aculeata, Rothschild. The name is fromGrk. 'echidna, an adder or viper, from the shape of thelong tongue.

1832. J. Bischoff, `Van Diemen's Land,' c. ii. p. 29:

«The native porcupine or echidna is not very common.»

1843. J.Backhouse, `Narrative of a Visit to the AustralianColonies,' p. 89:

«The Porcupine of this land, Echidna hystrix, is a squatspecies of ant-eater, with short quills among its hair: itconceals itself in the day time among dead timber in the hillyforests.»

1851. `Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of VanDiemen's Land,' vol. i. p. 178:

«Mr. Milligan mentioned that one of the Aborigines of Tasmaniareports having often discovered the nest of the EchidnaSetosa, porcupine or ant eater, of the colony; that onseveral occasions one egg had been found in it, andnever more: this egg has always been found to contain a foetus or chick, and is said to be round, considerablyless than a tennis ball, and without a shell. The mother issaid to sit continuously (for a period not ascertained) in themanner of the common fowl over the eggs; she does not leave theyoung for a considerable time after having hatched it; atlength, detaching it from the small teat, she moves outhurriedly and at long intervals in quest of food, the young onebecoming, at each successive return, attached to thenipple. . . The Platypus ( Ornithorhyncus paradoxus) issaid to lay two eggs, having the same external membranouscovering, but of an oblong shape.»

1860. G. Bennett,' Gatherings of a Naturalist in Australasia,'p. 147:

«The Porcupine Ant-eater of Australia ( Echidna hystrix)(the native Porcupine or Hedgehog of the colonists), and theOrnithorhynchus, to which it is allied in internalorganization, form the only two genera of the order Monotremata.»

1888. Cassell's' Picturesque Australasia,' vol. ii. p. 230:

«Among the gigantic boulders near the top he may capture theburrowing ant-eating porcupine, though if perchance he place itfor a moment in the stoniest ground, it will tax all hisstrength to drag it from the instantaneous burrow in which itwill defiantly embed itself.»

1892. A.Sutherland, `Elementary Geography of British Colonies,'p. 273:

«The echidna is an animal about a foot or 18 inches long,covered with spines like a hedgehog. It lives chiefly uponants. With its bill, which is like a duck's but narrower, itburrows into an ant's-hill, and then with its long, whip-like,sticky tongue, draws the ants into its mouth by hundreds.»

1894. R. Lydekker, `Marsupialia and Monotremata,' p. 247:

«In order to enable them to procure with facility their foodof ants and their larvae, echidnas are provided with very largeglands, discharging into the mouth the viscid secretion whichcauses the ants to adhere to the long worm-like tongue whenthrust into a mass of these insects, after being exposed by thedigging powers of the claws of the echidna's limbs. . . .When attacked they roll themselves into a ball similar to thehedgehog.»