Note 4 — CHAP. XXII.

At this time a small quadruped running through the camp with incredible swiftness, it was cut down by one of the rangers with his sabre. This proved to be the Paca or Spotted Cavey, called in Surinam the Aquatic Hare. This animal is the size of a sucking pig, and extremely fat. The under jaw is short, the nostrils large, the eyes black, and the ears small and naked. It has five toes on each foot, a tail like the first joint of a man’s thumb, and whiskers like a cat; the colour is an earthen brown, with longitudinal rows of buff-coloured spots; the belly is a dirty white, the hair all over coarse and short. The Paca is an amphibious animal. On land it digs up the earth like a hog in quest of food, and when in danger flies to the water for its safety; notwithstanding this animal is so very plump and heavy, it runs swifter than most other animals of its size in South America, contrary to the account given of it in the supplement to the Count de Buffon’s description4, where it is said “not to be nimble, to run but seldom, and then with a bad a grace;” which may all be the case in a domestic state (for the Paca is capable of being tamed) but he is not sluggish in a state of nature. This I know to be true, having seen him run like a hare. We had this animal dressed for supper, and found him even more delicious than the wood-rat, or even the warra-bocerra: indeed, nothing can be better eating than the Paca or spotted Cavy.