America. They are thus described by the celebrated traveller HUMBOLDT.

"After traversing a space of about fifty-three hundred yards, covered with the decayed trunks of trees, and in which there appeared here, and there projections of a limestone rock containing petrified corals, we reach an open place of about nine hundred and eight feet square, entirely destitute of vegetation. The surface was composed of layers of clay, of a dark gray color, cracked by desiccation into pentagonal and heptagonal prisms. The volcancitos consist of fifteen or twenty small truncated cones rising in the middle of this area, and having a height of from nineteen to twenty-five feet. The most elevated were on the southern sides, and their circumference at the base was from seventy-eight to eighty-five yards. On climbing to the top of these mud-volcanoes, we found them terminated by an aperture, from sixteen to thirty inches in diameter, filled with water, through which airbubbles obtained a passage, about five explosions usually taking place in two minutes. The force with which the air rises would lead to the supposition of its being subjected to considerable pressure, and a rather loud noise was heard at intervals, preceding the disengagement of it fifteen or eighteen seconds. Each of the bubbles contained from twelve to fourteen and a half cubic inches of elastic fluid, and their power of expansion was often so great that the water was projected beyond the crater or flowed over its brim. Some of the openings by which air escaped were situated in the plain without being surrounded by any prominence of the ground. It was observed that when the apertures, which are not placed at the summit of the cones, and are enclosed by a little mud wall from ten to fifteen inches high, are nearly contiguous, the explosions did not take place at the same time. It would appear that each crater receives the gas by distinct canals, or that these terminating in the same reservoir of compressed air, oppose greater or less impediments to the passage of the aeriform fluids. The cones have no doubt been raised by these fluids, and the dull sound that precedes the disengagement of them, indicates

that the ground is hollow. The natives asserted that there had been no observable change in the form and number of the cones for twenty years, and that the little cavities are filled with water even in the driest seasons. The temperature of this liquid was not higher than that of the atmosphere. A stick could easily be pushed into the apertures to the depth of six or seven feet, and the dark colored clay or mud was exceedingly soft. An ignited body was immediately extinguished on being immersed in the gas collected from the bubbles, which was found to be pure azote.

NATURAL HISTORY.

THE JAGUAR

THIS animal, sometimes called the American Tiger, is one of the most formidable animals of the New World. He is to be found in the southern division of America, from Paraguay to Guiana; but he does not appear to in

habit to the northward of the isthmus of Darien. the south the race is gradually growing more rare, in consequence of the double temptation to destroy him, which

Even in

is offered by the desire of getting rid of a beast so destructive to the flocks, and by the high price which is obtained for his skin.

"More robust and more clumsy than the leopard, he is also much superior in size, as he often measures four or five feet from the nose to the root of the tail. His head is larger and rounder than the leopard's, his limbs are shorter, and his tail is of such a length as only to allow the tip to trail on the ground when the animal stands erect. Above the line of the eyes, the profile is also more prominent. 'These differences of form (says Mr. Bennet) are accompanied by differences in color and markings equally decisive. The general appearance is at the first glance the same in both; but the open roses of the leopard are scarcely more than half the size of those of the Jaguar, and they all inclose a space of one uniform color, in which, unless in some rare and accidental instances, no central spots exist, while in the latter animal most of those which are arranged along the upper surface near the middle line of the back are distinguished by one or two small black spots enclosed within their circuit. The middle line itself is occupied in the leopard by open roses intermixed with a few black spots of small size and roundish form; that of the Jaguar, on the contrary, is marked by one or two regular longitudinal lines of broad, elongated, deep black patches, sometimes extending several inches in length, and occasionally forming an almost continuous band from between the shoulders to the tail. The black rings towards the tip of the latter are also more completely circular in the leopard.

The Jaguar is a solitary animal, residing in forests, especially near large rivers. He is an excellent swimmer. D'Azara tells us, partly from personal observation, that after a Jaguar had destroyed a horse, he dragged the body sixty paces, and then swam with it over a broad and deep river. He is equally expert at climbing. "I have seen (says M. Sonini) in the forests of Guiana, the prints left by the claws of the Jaguar on the smooth bark of a tree from forty to fifty feet in height, measuring about a foot and a half in circumference, and clothed with branches

near its summit alone. It was easy to follow with the eye the efforts which the animal had made to reach the branches: although his talons had been thrust deeply into the body of the tree, he had met with several slips, but he had always recovered his ground, and, attracted no doubt by some favorite object of prey, had at length succeeded by gaining the very top."

"The Jaguar lies in ambush for his prey, on which he pounces suddenly, and his great muscular strength enables him instantly to bear it to the ground.

Man he does

not often attack, and never but by stealth. While M. Sonini was travelling in Guiana, his party was closely dogged for three nights by one of these animals, which eluded all their attempts to shoot it, and would doubtless have carried off any individual who might have unguardedly exposed himself.

"Ferocious as he is in his wild state, the Jaguar, when captive, becomes tame and even mild, and is particularly fond of licking the hands of those familiar with him.”

SINGULAR ENCOUNTER WITH A LIONESS.

This is a representation of an occurrence which took place in the tower of London, and is strikingly illustrative, not only of the courage of the individual concerned, but also of the native superiority of the moral courage of man to the strength and ferocity of the inferior animals. The tale is well told in an elegant publication entitled "The Tower Menagerie.

"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 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 ardor almost unparalleled in the history of any other animal. From the moment she be comes a mother, the native ferocity of her disposition is