糖心美食流畅

《 糖心美食流畅》

the whole of their body beneath the water, retaining above the surface no more than the extremity of that organ for the admission and expulsion of the air. After having been for some time in the water, it is said that their skin loses the[171] dusky hue by which it is usually distinguished in consequence of the dirt and other matters with which it is incrusted, and assumes a perfect flesh-colour marked with numerous round and blackish spots. This natural colour is, however, lost almost immediately on their reaching the land, when they uniformly scatter themselves all over by means of their trunk with the mud or dust which first falls in their way. So fond are they of this process that they commonly recur to it whenever an opportunity offers. The bathing appears to be absolutely necessary in order to keep their skins to a certain extent supple and flexible; for which purpose their keepers, in captivity, occasionally have recourse to the smearing them with oil as a substitute.

It cannot be doubted that the lighter and slenderer shape of the Lioness, and her consequently greater activity, tend in an especial manner to the formation of that more lively and sensitive character by which all her actions are so strongly marked: but there is another cause, no less powerful than these, which operates with peculiar force, in the vivid excitability of her maternal feelings, which she cherishes with an ardour almost unparalleled in the history of any other animal. From the moment that she becomes a mother, the native ferocity of her disposition is renovated as it were with tenfold vigour; she watches over her young with that undefined dread of danger to their weak and defenceless state, and that suspicious eagerness of alarm, which keep her in a constant state of feverish excitation: and woe be to the wretched intruder, whether man or beast, who[13] should unwarily at such a time approach the precincts of her sanctuary. Even in a state of captivity, and however completely she may have been pr