THIS animal has been called Crab-eater, or Crab-dog, from his
principally living upon crabs. Some travellers have compared him to
the dog and the fox, but he has much more affinity to the opossums,
than whom, however, he is much larger, and the female does not carry
her young in a pouch under her belly; therefore the crab-eater appears
to be a different species, from any animal heretofore described.
There is a skin of one of these animals preserved in the royal cabinet,
which when transmitted to us was very young; it was a male, and
measured from the nose to the origin of the tail seventeen inches;
the tail rather more than fifteen inches and a half, and which was of
a greyish colour, scaly, and naked, gradually tapering to the point.
He was about six inches and a half high. He was very short, and at a
distance much resembled a terrier, his head being considerably like
that of a dog. His eyes were small, the edges of the eyebrows black,
and above the eyes there are hairs more than an inch long: he has
similar hairs near his ears, and his whiskers were an inch and a half
long, and black. He had a large crooked canine tooth on each side the
upper jaw, which reached below the under. His ears were brown, naked,
and round at the ends. His hair on the body woolly, of a dirty white at
the bottom, and dark brown at the ends, which is intermixed with long
coarse black hairs; the latter increase in length upon the thighs and
spine of the back, upon the last of which they are so long as to form
a kind of mane from the middle of it to the tail. On the sides and
belly the hair is of a yellowish white, inclining more to yellow on the
shoulders, thighs, neck, breast and head, mixed in some places with
brown; and the legs and feet of a blackish brown. There are five toes
on each foot; they are a little bent like those of a rat, the thumb
alone being straight; the latter on the hind feet is broad, thick, and
at a distance from the toes, as in apes, but on the fore-feet it is not
separate from them; and the thumbnails are flat, while those on the
other toes are crooked, and extend beyond the points.
I have been assured by M. de la Borde that these animals are very
common in the marshy places at Cayenne, and of whom he speaks in the
following terms: "These animals are very dexterous in climbing trees,
upon which they remain much longer than upon the ground, especially in
day-time. They have very fine teeth, and defend themselves from the
dogs. Their principal food is crabs, and yet they are always fat. If
they cannot get the crabs out of the holes with their feet, they then
make use of their tails, as a kind of hook; but the crabs sometimes
lay hold of it, and make the animal cry out; his cry resembles that of
a man, and is heard at a great distance, tho' its common voice is like
the grunting of a pig. The females bring forth in the hollows of old
trees, and generally have four or five young at a time. The natives of
the country eat their flesh, which is not unlike that of the hare. They
are easily tamed, and then are fed in the houses like dogs and cats,
with any kind of victuals; from which it is certain that their taste
for crabs is not exclusive."
There is said to be another species of crab-eater in Cayenne, which
differs from that we have described in the shape and proportions of its
body, in the structure of its feet and claws, and in its tail being
entirely covered with hair; and which besides seizes the crabs with its
paws only.