The deer really weeps, its eyes being provided with lachrymal glands.
Ants have brains larger in proportion to the size of their bodies than
any other living creature.
There are three varieties of the dog that never bark--the Australian
dog, the Egyptian shepherd dog and the "lion-headed" dog of Tibet.
The insect known as the water boatman has a regular pair of oars, his
legs being used as such. He swims on his back, as in this position
there is less resistance to his progress.
Seventeen parcels of ants' eggs from Russia, weighing 550 pounds, were
sold in Berlin recently for 20 cents a pound.
The peacock is now kept entirely, it would seem, for ornament--for
the ornament of garden terraces (among old-fashioned and trim-kept
yew hedges he is specially in place)--in his living state, and for
various æsthetic uses to which his brilliant plumage and hundred-eyed
tailfeathers are put when he is dead or moulting. But we seldom eat him
now, though he used to figure with the boar's head, the swan and the
baron of beef on those boards which were beloved by our forefathers,
more valiant trenchermen than ourselves. Yet young peahen is uncommonly
good eating, even now, at the end of the nineteenth century, and in the
craze that some people have for new birds--Argus pheasants, Reeve's
pheasants, golden pheasants and what not--to stock their coverts, it is
a wonder that some one has not tried a sprinkling of peacocks.