Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1873-01-01
aNistsllamu.
Along Tongue,

Wouldn't you think yours was a long
tongue, if it was as long as your whole
body? Well, odd as it seems, there is q
little fellow who lives in Africa, with JUS
such a tongue, and you can't imagine how
useful it is to him.
You see, he is digniied, slow moving
little fellow, end he lives Cd insects and
such lively game. He could never catch
them, and might starve to death only
that he can dart out his tongue as quick
as flash, and as long as his body. The
end of this droll weapon is sticky, and
holds fast any unfortunate bug or fly it
touches.
The little animal speak of is chanel
con; and his tongue isn't the only droll
thing about him. His eyes are very curl.
GUS To begin with, they are very large
and round, and stick out like big beads on
the side of his head. And the funniest
thing is, that he can turn them different
ways, so as to see all around him. He can
turn one up and the other down, or he can
turn one forward and the other back, and
thus everywhere. 1t must be very
small bug which can escape these SHARP
eyes.
And that isn't all about them. These
eyes are covered with eyelids all the
time. To be sure, there is hole in
the middle, where the bright eye looks
out, and he can contract or expand it
as he likes, but he can't uncover his eyes
as we can.
But his tongue and his eyes are not the
only odd thing about him; his feet are
droll as the rest He has FIVE toes Just as
you have, though they are more like a
binds claws than like your toes. They
are all long, and have caws on the ends
and then they are fastened together by
skin in a curious way Three of them are
fastened into one sort of bundle, and the
other two into another.
You can see how nicely this arrange
ment enables him to hold on to branches
of trees, where he lives All four of his
feet are fixed in the same way. And, as
if four such hands and feet were not
enough, his long, slim tail is as good as
another foot He can curl it around a
branch as monkey can his, and hold on
with it. Even when he walks on the
ground-which he don't much like to do
he steades himself with this useful tail.
Everything about this fellow is odd
His skin is not fastened tight to him, as it
is to most animals. 1t is more like a loose
bag, and he can swell it out into queer
shapes, or rather into a shapeless mass,
by filling it with air. And another oddly
about the skin is, that by peculiar ar
rangement of the cooring matter, he
sometimes looks one color, and sometimes
another, according to the way the light
strikes him. 1t is something like what
you have seen in changeabe silks.
Strange stories were told about this
curious little fellow, in old times. 1t was
really believed that he had no regular
color of his owD, but that he took the color
of the thing he was near, being green
among the leaves and brown on the
ground. That error was caused, OF
course, by the changes Of color [ spoke Of
Another error was the effect of his Gu.
rious habit of blowing himself up like q
bladder. 1t was said that he had no par
ticular shape. In fact, he had no charac.
ter of his own any way-nelther color nor
shape.
The wisest men of old times believed
these stories, and it seems droll enough tc
read of it in serious, wise books. Even
the name of the honest little fellow got to
mean one who changes his opinions to
suit everybody and has no fixed ideas OF
his own.
You see, it has taken hundreds of years,
and hundreds of men watching them, to
find out about these curious little fellows
and you can learn 1t all in five minutes
OliUe 1horne.