Ponies are imported from Sumatra, and a few horses from Australia, but
the latter do not thrive.
The domestic cat always looks as if half his tail had been taken off in
a trap. The domestic dog is the Asiatic, not the European dog, a leggy,
ugly, vagrant, uncared-for fellow, furnishing a useful simile and
little more.
Weasels, squirrels, polecats, porcupines, and other small animals exist
in numbers, and the mermaid, of the genus Halicore, connects the
inhabitants of the land and water. This Duyong, described as a
creature seven or eight feet long, with a head like that of an elephant
deprived of its proboscis, and the body and tail of a fish, frequents
the Sumatran and Malayan shores, and its flesh is held in great
estimation at the tables of sultans and rajahs. Besides these (and the
list is long enough) there are many small beasts.
The reptiles are unhappily very numerous. Crawfurd mentions forty
species of snakes, including the python and the cobra. Alligators in
great numbers infest the tidal waters of the rivers. Iguanas and
lizards of several species, marsh-frogs, and green tree-frogs abound.
The land-leeches are a great pest. Scorpions and centipedes are
abundant. There are many varieties of ants, among them a formidable-
looking black creature nearly two inches long, a large red ant, whose
bite is like a bad pinch from forceps, and which is the chief source of
formic acid, and the termes, or white ant, most destructive to timber.
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