Believe it or not, this
little chap is a mammal. Sure, he's ratlike (belonging to the order
Soricomorpha, mouselike, which includes shrews and moles), and to be sure he's
not beautiful. But he is amazing. The solenodon is an ancient beast,
the only mammal known to have survived the dinosaur cataclysm. It is
a little known creature, found only on the Caribbean island of
Hispaniola, and on Cuba. He defends himself by spitting poison, he
has a ball-and-socket joint in his nose and, they say, finds his prey
by echolocation.
Why am I telling you
this? Because it's important to realise that you don't have to be
beautiful to be interesting. I find that a comforting thought as my
ageing face slowly collapses into wrinkly decrepitude.
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