Gerald Durrell - THREE SINGLES TO ADVENTURE

At this point I feel it necessary to explain that a sloth on the ground is, in some ways, as helpless as a new-born kitten. His legs are designed to hang from, not walk on, so when he is on the ground his only means of progression is to reach forward with his long arms, get his claws hooked round something, and then pull himself forward. This is a laborious process, and anyone seeing it for the first time may be pardoned for thinking that the creature is suffering from paralysis or a broken back. But if you approach too close to those great claws or that tooth-filled mouth you will soon find that the animal is not quite so helpless as it first appears.

The sloth lay there with a vague expression on his face, blindly reaching out with his claws to find something to hook on to and finding nothing on the bare boards. Peeling that he was safe for the moment I turned my attention to his cage, for I was curious to discover how he had escaped. I found that two of the wooden slats I had nailed across the front had been ripped apart, nails and all, thus leaving a gap large enough for the sloth to squeeze through. How he had accomplished this feat I couldn't tell, but I supposed that he must have used his great claws as jemmies to lever the bars apart. While I was examining the damage Cuthbert came napping over and attempted to alight on my shoulder. I imagine he thought it was the safest place in the room. To his annoyance I pushed him off and went in search of hammer and nails. While I repaired the cage, Cuthbert came and sat on top of it and peered into my face with a worried expression, peeting vigorously. The noise I was making soon woke Bob, who came striding majestically into the room to inquire what the hell I thought I was doing, hammering at that hour of night.

"Mind the sloth," I said, for he was standing just inside the door.

As I spoke the creature rolled over and lashed out at him, missing his leg by a fraction of an inch. Bob leapt into the far corner of the room with remarkable agility and then turned and glared at the sloth.

"How did that brute get out?" he inquired.

"Ripped the bars off. I'll have the cage ready in a second, and then you can help me catch him."

"I must say you've done your best to make this trip a memorable one," said Bob bitterly.

"Never a dull moment. Just like a Buthn's Holiday Camp. First anacondas, then piranhas, and now sloths…" Cuthbert had greeted Bob's appearance with joy and had cunningly worked his way round the room until he gained his objective, the feet. Having reached them he lay across them and prepared for sleep.

When I had finished the cage I got an empty sack and approached the sloth, who was still groping helplessly around with his arms. As soon as he saw me coming he rolled over on to his back and prepared to do battle, lashing out with his claws and hissing like a kettle through his open jaws. After several attempts to get the sack over his head I decided that Bob had better enter the fray.

"Get that stick and attract his attention the other way," I directed. "Then I can get the sack over him."

Bob shuffled the indignant Cuthbert off his feet and then reluctantly approached the sloth, armed with the stick.

Cuthbert followed him. Bob made a pass at the sloth, and it immediately rolled over and made a pass at him. Bob stepped backwards and tripped over Cuthbert. I flung the sack while the beast's attention was distracted, and to my surprise it landed neatly over his head. I leapt at him, and with one hand I grabbed at that part of the sack that I hoped concealed the scruff of his neck, while with the other I tried to seize his front legs. I only succeeded in getting one front leg, and unfortunately I grasped it too high up.

Before I realized my mistake and could let go the massive claws had contracted, snapping down like the blade of a pocket knife and trapping my fingers in a vice-like grip. To make matters worse I discovered that I had not got him by the scruff of the neck, and at any minute I expected to see his head come out from under the sack, and to feel those yellow teeth embedded in my arm. Judging by the hissings that were coming from inside the sack his temper had not been improved by my attack. Bob and Cuthbert had by now disentangled themselves, in a state of mutual hostility, and so I implored my companion to hand me the stick; thus armed I felt better.

"If you can open the door of his cage I think I can lift him in," I said.

Bob did so, and just as I was trying to hoist the sloth up and carry him across the room, the sack fell off and his head came into view. I did the only thing I could think of, which was to thrust the stick across his jaws. His mouth snapped shut, and his teeth splintered the wood with the most bloodcurdling sound. I tried to lift him off the floor with my trapped hand, while keeping the stick in his mouth with the other. Just as I was succeeding in this very delicate juggling feat, Cuthbert came and lay down across my feet. I revolved slowly round, Cuthbert pursuing my ankles with delighted peetings, while the sloth dangled from one hand, chewing morosely at the stick and giving furious hisses at intervals.

"Can't you remove this damn bird?" I said angrily to Bob, who was leaning against the wall and laughing hysterically. "If you don't hurry up I shall get bitten."

Tearfully, Bob chased Cuthbert away, and I staggered across the room and tried to get the sloth in through the door of the cage. But, during the struggle, he got his hind feet hooked round the bars, and no amount of pulling would make him let go.

"Instead of standing there and laughing you might come and try to unhook this blasted animal," I said.

"You'd laugh too, if you could see yourself," replied Bob. "I particularly liked that pirouette you did with Cuthbert. Very elegant."

Eventually we got the sloth back into his cage, soothed Cuthbert and retired once more to our hammocks. The next day I got some wire-netting, and by the time I had finished with it, the sloth's cage was more difficult to break out of than Dartmoor .

The sloths have been subjected, since earliest times, to more gross misrepresentation than any other South American animals. They have been described as lazy, stupid, malformed, slow, ugly, in constant pain owing to their peculiar structure, and a host of other things. A fairly typical account is that given by one Gonzalo Ferdinando de Oviedo, quoted in Purcbas Pilgrims: There is another strange beast, which, by a name of contrary effect, the Spaniards call cagnuolo, that is, the Light Dogge, whereas it is one of the slowest beasts in the world, and so heavie and dull in moving, that it can scarcely goe fiftie pases in a whole day: they have foure sub till feete, and in every one of them foure clawes like unto birds, and joyaed together: yet are neither their clawes or their feet able to susteine their bodies from the ground. Their chiefe desire and delight is to cleave and sticke fast unto trees, or some other thing whereby they may climbe aloft. and whereas I my selfe have kept them in my house, I could never perceive other but that they live onely on aire: and of the same opinion are in like manner all men of those regions, because they have never scene them cate any thing, but ever turne their heads and mouthes towards that part where the wind bloweth most, whereby may be considered that they take most pleasure in the ayre. They bite not, or yet can bite, having very little mouthes: they are not venemous or noyous any way, but altogether brutish, and utterly unprofitable, and without commoditie yet know ne to man.

Thus does Oviedo , with an almost journalistic skill, give a most inaccurate picture of the sloth. Firstly, the sloth is not such a sluggard that it can only accomplish 'fiftie pases' in a day. Travelling at full speed I should imagine that it could cover several miles in a day, providing, of course, that its path from tree to tree was clear. But the truth of the matter is that the sloth has no burning ambition to go dashing madly about the forest; so long as he is in a tree that provides him with ample food he is quite content to stay there. Oviedo goes on to make those very disparaging remarks about the sloth's arms and legs. He condemns these appendages because, as he points out, they are unable to 'susteine' the body from the ground. Now the sloth is not a terrestrial animal, but strictly arboreal; it will not descend from the trees unless it is absolutely necessary, and, when it does, it finds walking difficult or almost impossible because its legs are adapted for life in the trees. You cannot expect a sloth to run about the ground like a deer, any more than you would expect a deer to swing nimbly about in the branches of a tree. However, instead of praising the sloth for its wonderful adaptation to an arboreal existence, Oviedo busily points out that it cannot walk on the ground, a thing it has no desire to do and is quite unfitted for.