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Terra Incognita Critters I

Animals and Insects

Ant

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Anteater

More than six varieties of anteater are also found here, and more than twenty kinds of small, fleet, single-horned tabuk.

Explorers 312

A great spined anteater, more than twenty feet in length, shuffled about the edges of the camp. We saw its long, thin tongue dart in and out of its mouth. ''It is harmless,'' I said, ''unless you cross its path or disturb it.'' It lived on the white ants, or termites, of the vicinity, breaking apart their high, towering nests of toughened clay, some of them thirty-five feet in height, with its mighty claws, then darting its four-foot-long tongue, coated with adhesive saliva, among the nest's startled occupants, drawing thousands in a matter of moments into its narrow, tubelike mouth.

Explorer 293

Banded Ost

The banded ost is a variety of ost, a small, customarily brilliantly orange Gorean reptile. It is exceedingly poisonous. The banded ost is yellowish orange and is marked with black rings.

Assassin 335

Barrens Kailla

The Red Savages, as they are commonly called on Gor, are racially and culturally distinct from the Red Hunters of the north. Their culture tends to be nomadic, and is based on the herbivorous, lofty kaiila, substantially the same animal as is found in the Tahari, save for the wider footpads of the Tahari beast, suitable for negotiating deep sand, and the lumbering, gregarious, short-tempered, trident-homed kailiauk. To be sure, some tribes do not have the kaiila, never having mastered it, and certain tribes have mastered the tam, which tribes are the most dangerous of all.

Savages 35

Bosk

The bosk, without which the Wagon Peoples could not live, is an oxlike creature. It is a huge, shambling animal, with a thick, humped neck and long, shaggy hair. It has a wide head and tiny red eyes, a temper to match that of a sleen, and two long, wicked horns that reach out from its head and suddenly curve forward to terminate in fearful points. Some of these horns, on the larger animals, measured from tip to tip, exceed the length of two spears. Not only does the flesh of the bosk and the milk of its cows furnish the Wagon Peoples with food and drink, but its hides cover the domelike wagons in which they dwell; it's tanned and dew skins cover their bodies; the leather of its hump is used for their shields; its sinews forms their thread; its bones and horns are split and tooled into implements of a hundred sorts, from awls, punches and spoons to drinking flagons and weapon tips; its hoofs are used for glues; its oils are used to grease their bodies against the cold. Even the dung of the bosk finds its uses on the treeless prairies, being dried and used for fuel. The bosk is said to be the Mother of the Wagon Peoples, and they reverence it as such. The man who kills one foolishly is strangled in thongs or suffocated in the hide of the animal he slew; if, for any reason, the man should kill a bosk cow with unborn young he is staked out, alive, in the path of the herd, and the march of the Wagon Peoples takes its way over him.

Nomads 4

There were only a few bosk visible, and they were milk bosk. The sheds I saw would accommodate many more animals. I surmised, as is common in Torvaldsland, most of the cattle had been driven higher into the mountains, to graze wild during the summer, to be fetched back to the shed only in the fall, with the coming of winter.

Marauders 82

They were northern tabuk, massive, tawny and swift; many of them ten hands at the shoulder, a quite different animal from the small, yellow-pelted antelope-like quadruped of the south. On the other hand, they too were distinguished by the single horn of the tabuk. On these animals, however, that object, in swirling ivory, was often, at its base, some two and one half inches in diameter, and better than a yard in length. A charging tabuk, because of the swiftness of its reflexes, is quite a dangerous animal. Usually they are killed from a distance, often from behind shields, with arrows.

Beasts 152

The bosk is a large, horned, shambling ruminant of the Gorean plains. It is herded below the Gorean equator by the Wagon Peoples, but there are Bosk herds on ranches in the north as well, and peasants often keep some of the animals.

Raiders 26

Centipede

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Common Ost

After dark, various serpents seek out the road for its warmth, its stones retaining the sun's heat longer than the surrounding countryside. One to be feared even more perhaps was the tiny ost, a venomous, brilliantly orange reptile little more than a foot in length, whose bite spelled an excruciating death within seconds.

Outlaw 26

Deer

''Perhaps,'' suggested Gorm, ''it is diseased or injured, and can no longer hunt the swift deer of the north?''

Marauders 108

Domestic Verr

I passed fields that were burning, and burning huts of peasants, the smoking shells of Sa-Tarna granaries, the shattered, slatted coops for vulos, the broken walls of keeps for the small, long-haired domestic verr, less belligerent and sizable than the wild verr of the Voltai ranges.

Nomads 10

In the distance, above the acres, I could see the mountains, snow-capped. A flock of verr, herded by a maid with a stick, turned, bleating on the sloping hillside.

Marauders 81

''We are passing another market,'' I said. ''Verr milk, Masters!'' I heard called. ''Verr milk, Masters!'' I opened the slats a tiny crack. I wished to see if she were pretty. She was, in her tunic and collar, kneeling on a white blanket, spread on the cement, with the brass container of verr milk, with its strap, near her, and the tiny brass cups. She was extremely lightly complexioned and had very red hair. ''Verr milk, Masters,'' she called. Slaves may buy and sell in the name of their masters, but they cannot, of course, buy and sell for themselves because they are only animals. It is rather for them to be themselves bought and sold, as the masters might please.

Savages 61

The Wagon Peoples war among themselves, but once in every two hands of years, there is a time of gathering of the peoples, and this, I had learned, was that time. In the thinking of the Wagon Peoples it is called the Omen Year, though the Omen Year is actually a season, rather than a year, which occupies a part of two of their regular years, for the Wagon Peoples calculate the year from the Season of Snows to the Season of Snows; Turians, incidentally, figure the year from summer solstice to summer solstice; Goreans generally, on the other hand, figure the year from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, their new year beginning, like nature's, with the spring; the Omen Year, or season, lasts several months, and consists of three phases, called the Passing of Turia, which takes place in the fad; the Wintering, which takes place north of Turia and commonly south of the Cartius, the equator of course lying to the north in this hemisphere; and the Return to Curia, in the spring, or, as the Wagon Peoples say, in the Season of Little Grass. It is near Turia, in the spring, that the Omen Year is completed, when the omens are taken usually over several days by hundreds of haruspexes, mostly readers of bosk blood and verr livers, to determine if they are favorable for a choosing of a Ubar San, a One Ubar, a Ubar who would be High Ubar, a Ubar of an the Wagons, a Ubar of all the Peoples, one who could lead them as one people.

Nomads 11

Draft Tharlarion

Behind them, stretching into the distance, came a long line of broad tharlarions, or the four-footed draft monsters of Gor. These beasts, yoked in braces, were drawing mighty wagons, filled with merchandise protected under the lashings of its red rain-canvas.

Tarnsman 118

A bejeweled, curtained platform slung beneath the slow, swaying bodies of two of the broad tharlarions appeared. The beasts were halted by their strap-master, and after some seconds the curtains parted.

Tarnsman 119

Forest Sleen

The two most common sorts of trained sleen are the smaller, tawny prairie sleen, and the large, brown or black forest sleen, sometimes attaining a length of twenty feet.

Slave Girl 185

Frevet

''That is a frevet.'' The frevet is a small, quick, mammalian insectivore. ''We have several in the house,'' he said. ''They control the insects, the beetles and lice, and such.'' Boabissia was silent. ''Not every insula furnishes frevets,'' said the proprietor. ''They are charming as well as useful creatures. You will probably grow fond of them. You will probably wish to keep your door open at night, for coolness, and to give access to them. They cannot gnaw through walls like urts, you know.''

Mercenaries 276

Gatch

On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts. Several varieties of tarsk, large all, also inhabit this zone.

Explorers 312

Giani

In the lower branches of the ''ground zone'' may be found, also, small animals, such as tarsiers, nocturnal jit monkeys, black squirrels, four-toed leaf urts, jungle varts and the prowling, solitary giani, tiny, cat-sized panthers, not dangerous to man.

Explorers 312

High Tharlarion

The ringing of the tharlarion's shod claws on the road grew louder. In a minute the rider appeared in view, a fine, bearded warrior with a golden helmet and a tharlarion lance. He drew the riding lizard to a halt a few paces from me. He rode the species of tharlarion which ran on its two back feet in great bounding strides. Its cavernous mouth was lined with long, gleaming teeth. Its two small, ridiculously disproportionate forelegs dangled absurdly in front of its body.

Tarnmen 115

Hith

In one cage, restlessly lifting its swaying head, there coiled a great, banded hith, Gor's most feared serpentine constrictor. It was native only to certain areas of the forest.

Captive 210

In another case, somnolent and swollen, I saw a rare golden hith, a Gorean python whose body , even when unfed, it would be difficult for a full-grown man to encircle with his arms.

Priest Kings 191

Also in the ground zone are varieties of snake, such as the ost and hith, and numerous species of insects.

Explors 311

Horned Thalarion

Kuurus pointed to a fruit on a flat-topped wagon with wooden wheels, drawn by a small four-legged, horned tharlarion.

Assassin 7

Hurt

Cernus of Ar wore a coarse black robe, woven probably from the wool of the bounding, two legged Hurt, a domesticated marsupial raised in large numbers in the environs of several of Gor's Northern Cities. The Hurt, raised on large, fenced ranches, herded by domesticated sleen and sheered by chained slaves, replaces its wool four times a year.

Assassin 39

Jungle Larl

On the jungle floor, as well, are found jungle larls and jungle panthers, of diverse kinds, and many smaller catlike predators. These on the whole, however, avoid men. They are less dangerous in the rain forest, generally, than in the northern latitudes. I do not know why this should be the case. Perhaps it Is because in the rain forest food is usually plentiful for them, and, thus, there is little temptation for them to transgress the boundaries of their customary prey categories. They will however, upon occasion, particularly if provoked or challenged, attach with dispatch.

Explorers 312

Kailiauk

Kailiauk are four-legged, wide-headed, lumbering, stocky ruminants. Their herds are usually found in the savannahs and plains north and south of the rain forests, but some herds frequent the forests as well. These animals are short-trunked and tawny. They commonly have brown and reddish bars on their haunches. The males, trident-like, have three horns. These horns bristle from their foreheads. The males are usually about ten hands at the shoulders and the females about eight hands. The males average about four hundred to five hundred Gorean stone in weight, some sixteen hundred to two thousand pounds, and the females average about three to four hundred Gorean stone in weight, some twelve hundred to sixteen hundred pounds.

Explorers 93

The kailiauk in question, incidently, is the kailiauk of the Barrens. It is a gigantic, dangerous beast, often standing from twenty to twenty five hands at the shoulder and weighing as much as four thousand pounds.

Savages 40

Even past me there thundered a lumbering herd of startled, short-bunked kailiauk, a stocky, awkward ruminant of the plains, tawny, wild, heavy, their haunches marked in red and brown bars, their wide heads bristling with a trident of horns.

Nomads 2

Larl

The larl's head is broad, sometimes more than two feet across, and shaped roughly like a triangle, giving its skull something of the cast of a viper's save that of course it is furred and the pupils of the eyes like the cat's and unlike the viper's, can range from knifelike slits in the broad daylight to dark, inquisitive moons in the night. The pelt of the larl is normally a tawny red or a sable black. The black larl, which is predominantly nocturnal, is maned, both male and female. The red larl, which hunts whenever hungry, regardless of the hour, and is the more common variety, possesses no mane. Females of both varieties tend generally to be slightly smaller than the males, but are quite as aggressive and sometimes even more dangerous, particularly in the late fall and winter of the year when they are likely to be hunting for their cubs. I had once killed a male red larl in the Voltai Range within pasangs of the city of Ar.

Priest Kings 18

I saw even a black larl, a huge catlike predator more commonly found in mountainous regions; it was stalking away, retreating unhurried like a king; before what, I asked myself, would even the black larl flee; and I asked myself how far it had been driven; perhaps even from the mountains of Ta Thassa, that loomed in this hemisphere, Gor's southern, at the shore of Thassa, the sea, said to be in the myths without a farther shore.

Nomads 2

Leem

The hunter pulled a pelt from the bundle of furs he carried. It was snowy white, and thick, the winter fur of a two-stomached snow lart. Such a pelt could sell in Ar for half a silver tarsk. The snow lart hunts in the sun. The food in the second stomach can be held almost indefinitely. It is filled in the fall and must last the larl through the winter night, which lasts months, the number of months depending on the latitude of his individual territory. It is not a large animal. It is about ten inches high and, weighs between eight and twelve pounds. It is mammalian, and has four legs. It eats birds eggs and preys on the leem, a small arctic rodent, some five to ten ounces in weight, which hibernates during the winter.

Beasts 74

Monkeys

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on. In the lower portion of the canopies, too, can be found heavier birds, such as the ivory-billed woodpecker and the umbrella bird. Guernon monkeys, too, usually inhabit this level.

Explorers 311

In the lower branches of the ''ground zone'' may be found, also, small animals, such as tarsiers, nocturnal jit monkeys, black squirrels, four-toed leaf urts, jungle varts and the prowling, solitary giani, tiny, cat-sized panthers, not dangerous to man.

Explorers 312

Panthers

He had worn at his loins the pelts of the yellow panther.

Explorers 236

On the jungle floor, as well, are found jungle larls and jungle panthers, of diverse kinds, and many smaller catlike predators. These, on the whole, however, avoid men. They are less dangerous in the rain forest, generally, than in the northern latitudes. I do not know why this should be the case. Perhaps it is because in the rain forest food is usually plentiful for them, and, thus, there is little temptation for them to transgress the boundaries of their customary prey categories. They will, however, upon occasion, particularly if provoked or challenged, attack with dispatch.

Explorers 313

As I ran through the darkness I suddenly saw, before me, some fifty or sixty yards away, four pairs of blazing eyes, a pride of forest panthers. I pretended not to see them and, heart pounding, turned to one side, walking through the trees. At this time, at night, I knew they would be hunting. Our eyes had not met. I had the strange feeling that they had seen me, and knew that I had seen them, as I had seen them, and sensed that they had seen me. But our eyes had not directly met. We had not, so to speak, signaled to one another that we were aware of one another.

Captive 181

We heard, as is not uncommon, the screams of forest panthers within the darkness of the trees.

Hunters 76

Plains Kailla

The mount of the Wagon Peoples, unknown in the northern hemispheres of Gor, is the terrifying but beautiful kaiila. It is a silken, carnivorous, lofty creature, graceful, long-necked, smooth-gaited. It is viviparous and undoubtedly mammalian. A kaiila, which normally stands about twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder, can cover as much as six hundred pasangs in a single day's riding. The head of the kaiila bears two large eyes, one on each side, but these eyes are triply lidded, probably an adaptation to the environment which occasionally is wracked by severe storms of wind and dust; the adaptation, actually a transparent third lid, permits the animal to move as it wishes under conditions that force other prairie animals to back into the wind, or like the sleen, to burrow into the ground.

Nomads 13

The kaiila of these men were as tawny as the brown grass of the prairie, save for that of the man who faced me, whose mount was a silken, sable black, as black as the lacquer of the shield.

Nomads 14

I saw the kaiila tense, almost like larls, their flanks quivering, their large eyes intent upon me. I saw one of the long, triangular tongues dart out and back. Their long ears were laid back against the fierce, silken heads.

Nomads 15

Nearby our tethered kaiila crouched, their paws on the bodies of slain verrs, devouring them.

Nomads 271

Porcupine

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Prairie Sleen

The two most common sorts of trained sleen are the smaller, tawny prairie sleen, and the large, brown or black forest sleen, sometimes attaining a length of twenty feet.

Slave Girl 185

As we passed among the wagons I leaped back as a tawny prairie sleen hurled itself against the bars of a sleen cage, reaching out for me with its six-clawed paw. There were four other prairie sleen in the cage, a small cage, and they were curling and moving about one another, restlessly, like angry snakes. They would be released with the fan of darkness to run the periphery of the herds, acting, as I have mentioned, as shepherds and sentinels. They are also used if a slave escapes, for the sleen is an efficient, tireless, savage, almost infallible hunter, capable of pursuing a scent, days old, for hundreds of pasangs until, perhaps a month later, it finds its victim and tears it to pieces.

Nomads 28

Quala

Small straight bows, of course, not the powerful long bow, are, on the other hand, reasonably common on Gor, and these are often used for hunting light game, such as the brush-maned, three-toed Qualae, the yellow-pelted, single-horned Tabuk, and runaway slaves.

Raiders 4

Rennel

I was told by Kamchak that once an army of a thousand wagons turned aside because a swarm of rennels, poisonous, crablike desert insects, did not defend its broken nest, crushed by the wheel of the lead wagon.

Nomads 27

She was gasping and stumbling; her body glistened with perspiration; her legs were black with wet dust; her hair was tangled and thick with dust; her feet and ankles were bleeding; her calves were scratched and speckled with the red bites of rennels.

Nomads 135

Rock Tharlarion

The tiny, six-toed rock tharlarion of southern Torvaldsland, favored for their legs and tails, which are speared by children.

Marauders 152

I looked at the tiny lamp on the shelf near the door. It smoked, and burned oil, probably from tiny rock tharlarions, abundant south of Tor in the spring.

Tribesmen 222

Sand Fly

Following such rains great clouds of sand flies appear wakened from dormancy. These feast on kaiila and men. Normally, flying insects are found only in the vicinity of the oases. Crawling insects of various sorts, and predator insects, however, are found in many areas, even far from water. The zadit is a small, tawny-feathered, sharp-billed bird. It feeds on insects. When sand files and other insects, emergent after rains, infest kaiila, they frequently alight on the animals, and remain on them for some hours, hunting insects. This relieves the kaiila of the insects but leaves it with numerous small wounds, which are unpleasant and irritating, where the bird has dug insects out of it's hide. These tiny wounds, if they become infected, turn into sores; these sores are treated by the drovers with poultices of kaiila dung.

Tribesmen 152

Sand Kaiila

The sand kaiila, or desert kaiila, is a kaiila, and handles similarly, but it is not identically the same animal which is indigenous, domestic and wild, in the middle latitudes of Gor's southern hemisphere; that animal, used as a mount by the Wagon Peoples, is not found in the northern hemisphere of Gor; there is obviously a phylogenetic affinity between the two varieties, or species; I conjecture, though I do not know, that the sand kaiila is a desert-adapted mutation of the subequatorial stock; both animals are lofty, proud, silken creatures, long-necked and smooth-gaited; both are triply lidded, the third lid being a transparent membrane, of great utility in the blasts of the dry storms of the southern plains or the Tahari; both creatures are comparable in size, ranging from some twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder; both are swift; both have incredible stamina; under ideal conditions both can range six hundred pasangs in a day; both, too, I might mention, are high-strung, vicious-tempered animals; in pelt the southern kaiila ranges from a rich gold to black; the sand kaiila, on the other hand, are almost all tawny, though I have seen black sand kaiila; differences, some of them striking and important, however, exist between the animals; most notably, perhaps, the sand kaiila suckles its young; the southern kaiila are viviparous, but the young, within hours after birth, hunt, by instinct; the mother delivers the young in the vicinity of game; whereas there is game in the Tahari, birds, small mammals, an occasional sand sleen, and some species of tabuk, it is rare; the suckling of the young in the sand kaiila is a valuable trait in the survival of the animal; a similar difference between the two animals, or two sorts of kaiila, is that the sand kaiila is omnivorous, whereas the southern kaiila is strictly carnivorous; both have storage tissues; if necessary, both can go several days without water; the southern kaiila also, however, has a storage stomach, and can go several days without meat; a more trivial difference between the sand kaiila and the southern kaiila is that the paws of the sand kaiila are much broader, the digits even webbed with leathery fibers, and heavily padded, than those of its southern counterpart.

Tribesmen 70

Scorpion

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Slee

On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts.

Explorers 313

Sleen

In the wild, the sleen is a burrowing, predominantly nocturnal animal. It is carnivorous. It is a tenacious hunter, and an indefatigable tracker. It will attack almost anything, but its preferred prey is tabuk. It mates once a year in the Gorean spring, and there are usually four young in each litter. The gestation period is some six months. The young are commonly white furred at birth, the fur darkening by the following spring. Snow sleen, however, remain white-pelted throughout their life. Most domestic sleen are bred. It is difficult to take and tame a wild sleen. Sometimes young sleen, following the killing of the mother, are dug out of a burrow and raised. If they can be taken within the first two months of their life, which seems to be a critical period, before they have tasted blood and meat in the wild, and made their own kills, there is apparently a reasonably good chance that they can be domesticated; otherwise, generally not. Although grown, wild sleen have been caught and domesticated, this is rare. Even a sleen which has been taken young may revert. These reversions can be extremely dangerous. They usually take place, as would be expected, in the spring, during the mating season. Male sleen, in particular, can be extremely restless and vicious during this period.

Slave 185

It is true that sleen sometimes make kills swiftly and silently. ''It could be a panther come from the woods, or a strayed larl,'' said one of the men. This was less likely than a sleen attack. Though panthers and larls can be extremely dangerous to men they will usually attack men only if they are disturbed or other prey is not available. Sleen, which tend to be fine hunters and splendid trackers, which are swiftly moving, aggressive, serpentine, generally nocturnal animals, particularly in the wild state, are less fastidious about their eating habits.

Players 184

Sloth

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Snow Larl

I was struck with wonder, though I was careful to keep beyond the range of their chains, for I had never seen white larls before. They were gigantic beasts, superb specimens, perhaps eight feet at the shoulder. Their upper canine fangs, like daggers mounted in their jaws, must have been at least a foot in length and extended well below their jaws in the manner of ancient saber-toothed tigers. The four nostril slits of each animal were flared and their great chests lifted and fell with the intensity of their excitement. Their tails, long and tufted at the end, lashed back and forth.

Priest Kings 22

Snow Lart

The hunter pulled a pelt from the bundle of furs he carried. It was snowy white, and thick, the winter fur of a two-stomached snow lart. Such a pelt could sell in Ar for half a silver tarsk. The snow lart hunts in the sun. The food in the second stomach can be held almost indefinitely. It is filled in the fall and must last the larl through the winter night, which lasts months, the number of months depending on the latitude of his individual territory. It is not a large animal. It is about ten inches high and, weighs between eight and twelve pounds. It is mammalian, and has four legs. It eats birds eggs and preys on the leem, a small arctic rodent, some five to ten ounces in weight, which hibernates during the winter.

Beasts 74

Snow Sleen

The red hunters are generally a kind, peaceable folk, except with animals. Two sorts of beasts are kept in domestication in the north; the first sort of beast is the snow sleen; the second is the white-skinned woman.

Beasts 75

I saw a woman putting out a pan for a domestic snow sleen to lick clean.

Beasts 196

Wild snow sleen, particularly when hunger drives them to run in packs, can be quite dangerous.

Beasts 266

There are upon occasion wild snow sleen in the tundra, half starved and maddened by hunger. They constitute one of the dangers of traveling in the winter. Such sleen, together with the cold and the darkness, tend to close the arctic in the winter. No simple trader ventures north in that time.

Beasts 291

Spider

Vints, insects, tiny, sand-colored, covered them. On the same rinds, taking and eating vints, were two small cell spiders.

Tribesmen 115

This afternoon, late, when we had come inland, almost in the dusk, she had become entangled in the web of a rock spider, a large one. They are called rock spiders because of their habit of holding their legs folded beneath them. This habit, and their size and coloration, usually brown and black, suggests a rock, and hence the name. It is a very nice piece of natural camouflage. A thin line runs from the web to the spider. When something strikes the web the tremor is transmitted by means of this line to the spider. Interestingly the movement of the web in the air, as it is stirred by wind, does not activate the spider; similarly if the prey which strikes the web is too small, and thus not worth showing itself for, or too large, and thus beyond its prey range, and perhaps dangerous, it does not reveal itself. On the other hand, should a bird, such as a mindar or parrot, or a small animal, such as a leaf urt or tiny tarsk, become entangled in the net the spider swiftly emerges. It is fully capable of taking such prey.

Explorers 294

I went to the edge of the depression. There, a few feet below me, suspended in a gigantic web, was Janice. One of her legs was through the web, and an arm. It was not simply the adhesiveness of the webs strands which prevented her from freeing herself but, also, its swaying and elasticity, sinking beneath her as she tried to press against it. I looked down. The web was now trembling. Approaching her now, moving swiftly across the web, was a gigantic rock spider. It was globular, hairy, brown and black, some eight feet in thickness. It had pearly eyes and black, side-hinged jaws.

Explorers 390

Spiral Horned Verr

The verr was a mountain goat indigenous to the Voltai. It was a wild, agile, ill-tempered beast, long-haired and spiral-horned. Among the Voltai crags it would be worth ones life to come within twenty yards of one.

Priest-Kings 63

I saw four or five small cooking fires, such as might mark the camp of a mountain patrol or a small company of hunters, perhaps after the agile and bellicose Gorean mountain goat, the long-haired, spiral-horned verr.

Tarnsman 148

Squirrels

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

Tabuk

Ripped in the talons of the tarn was the dead body of an antelope, one of the one-horned, yellow antelopes called tabuks that frequent the bright Ka-la-na thickets of Gor.

Tarnsman 146

The tabuk is the most common Gorean antelope, a small graceful animal, one-horned and yellow, that haunts the Ka-la-na thickets of the planet and occasionally ventures into its meadows in search of berries and salt. It is also one of the favorite kills of a tarn.

Outlaw 126

Tabuk hide is the warmest pelt in the artic. Each of the hairs of the northern tabuk, interestingly, is hollow. This trapped air, contained in each of the hollow hairs, gives the fur excellent insulating properties.

Beasts 163

More than six varieties of anteater are also found here, and more than twenty kinds of small, fleet, single-horned tabuk.

Explorers 312

Once a tabuk, a prairie tabuk, tawny in the Barrens, single-horned, gazellelike, had grazed nearby. It had browsed within feet of us. In a sense this had pleased me, suggesting that out quarry might be in the vicinity; in a sense it had displeased me, suggesting that abundant, alternative game might also be in the vicinity, the tabuk tending to travel in herds. Some varieties of prairie tabuk, interestingly, when sensing danger, tend to lie down. This is counterinstinctual for most varieties of tabuk, which, when sensing danger, tend to freeze, in a tense, standing position and then, if alarmed further, tend to scurry away, depending on their agility and speed to escape predators. The standing position, of course, as is the case with bipedalian creatures, tends to increase their scanning range. The response disposition of lying down, apparently selected fro in some varieties of tabuk, tends to be useful in an environment in which high grass is plentiful and one of the most common predators depends, primarily on vision to detect and locate its prey. This predator, as would be expected, normally attacks from a direction in which its shadow does not precede it. Any tabuk, of course, if it is sufficiently alarmed, will bound away. It can attain short-term speeds of from eighty to ninety pasangs an Ahn. Its evasive leaps, in the Gorean gravity, can cover from thirty to forty feet in length, and attain heights of ten to fifteen feet.

Blood Brothers 316

Tarsk

I heard the squealing of a domestic tarsk running nearby, its feet scuttling in the woven rence of the island, as on a mat. A child was crying out, chasing it.

Raiders 16

Several varieties of tarsk, large and small, also inhabit this zone.

Explorers 312

The giant tarsk, which can stand ten hands at the shoulder, is even hunted with lances from tarnback.

Exporers 346

Among the animals I saw many verrs; some domestic tarsks, their tusks sheathed; cages of flapping vulos, some sleen, some kaiila, even some bosk.

Nomads 171

Termite

Termites, incidentally, are extremely important to the ecology of the forest. In their feeding they break down and destroy the branches and trunks of fallen trees. The termite ''dust,'' thereafter, by the action of bacteria, is reduced to humus, and the humus to nitrogen and mineral materials.

Explorers 312

Tharlarian

Rather our mounts were typical of the breeds from which are extracted racing tharlarion, of the sort used, for example, in the Vennan races. To be sure, it is only select varieties of such breeds, such as the Venetzia, Torarii and Thalonian, which are commonly used for the racers. As one might suppose, the blood lines of the racers are carefully kept and registered, as are, incidentally, those of many other sorts of expensive bred animals, such as tarsks, sleen and verr.

Magicians 290

Urt

The urt is a loathsome, horned Gorean rodent; some are quite large, the size of wolves or ponies, but most are very small, tiny enough to be held in the palm of one hand.

Nomads 125

I saw a tiny brush urt scurry past.

Hunters 106

I found myself alone in the darkness. It was about an Ahn, I conjectured, before daylight. I trod the narrow walkway lining the canal. Then, suddenly, falling to my hands and knees, I threw up into the dark waters. I heard one of the giant canal urts twist in the water somewhere beneath me.

Raiders 119

Over her shoulder she had two small, furred animals, hideous forest urts, about the size of cats.

Captives 237

Here, too, may be found snakes and monkeys, gliding urts, leaf urts, squirrels, climbing, long-tailed porcupines, lizards, sloths, and the usual varieties of insects, ants, centipedes, scorpions, beetles and flies, and so on.

Explorers 311

It was a giant urt, fat, sleek, and white; it bared its three rows of needlelike white teeth at me and squealed in anger; two horns, tusks like flat crescents curved from its jaw; another two horns similar to the first, modifications of the bony tissue forming the upper ridge of the eye socket protruded over those gleaming eyes that seemed to feast themselves upon me.

Outlaw 86

''It could be urts,'' said a man. ''It is near the time of the year for their movements.'' Certain species of urts migrate twice a year. At such times, annually, it is usually necessary only to avoid them. People usually remain indoors when a pack is in their vicinity. There is little danger from these migrations unless one finds oneself in their direct path. The urt, on the whole, most species of which are quite small, large enough to be lifted in one hand, does not pose much direct threat to human beings. Then can destroy Sa-Tarna fields and force their way into granaries. Similarly urts of the sort which live on garbage cast into the canals will often, unhesitantly, attack swimmers. Certain forms of large, domesticated urt, incidentally, should be excepted from these remarks. They are especially bred for attacking and killing. Such animals, however, are inferior to sleen for such purposes. They also lack the tracking capabilities of the sleen. Similarly they lack its intelligence. There was at least one good additional reason, incidentally, for supposing that whatever might be perplexing the brigands was not urts. The urts do not make their kills neatly and silently. They normally attack in a pack. It is usually a messy business. There is usually much blood and screaming.

Players 184

Ushindi Ost

I looked to the round, shallow, circular pit in the center of the room. It was about a foot deep. The poles supporting the sleeping platform were set within it. In the pit, his hands still clutching, fingernails bloody, at one of the round poles supporting the platform, lay an askari. His body was twisted horribly, and contorted. The flesh had turned a blackish orange and, in places, had broken open, the skin' peeling back like burned paper. A knife, fallen, lay near him in the pit About his body, small, nervous, sinuous, crawled tiny snakes, osts. Each of these, startlingly, had tied to it a thin string. There were eight such diminutive reptiles. The strings, fastened behind their heads, led up to a pole at the head of the sleeping platform, where they were tied. A woven basket hung, too, near the foot of the sleeping platform. The ost is usually an orange snake, but these were Ushindi osts, which are red with black stripes. Anatomically, and with respect to toxin, I am told they are almost identical to the common ost.

Explorers 239

Vart

I could, however, recognize a row of brown varts, clinging upside down like large matted fists of teeth and fur and leather on the heavy, bare, scarred branch in their case.

Priest Kings 191

Perhaps most I dreaded those nights filled with the shreiks of the vart pack, a blind, batlike swarm of flying rodents, each the size of a small dog. They could strip a carcass in a matter of minutes.

Outlaw 26

The Vart is a small, sharp-toothed winged mammal, carnivorous, which commonly flies in flocks.

Explorers 36

In the lower branches of the ''ground zone'' may be found, also, small animals, such as tarsiers, nocturnal jit monkeys, black squirrels, four-toed leaf urts, jungle varts and the prowling, solitary giani, tiny, cat-sized panthers, not dangerous to man. On the floor itself are also found several varieties of animal life, in particular marsupials, such as the armored gatch, and rodents, such as slees and ground urts.

Explorers 313

Winged Tharlarion (UI)

Also at night, crossing the bright disks of Gor's three moons, might ocassionally be seen the silent, predatory shadow of the ul, a giant oterodactyl ranging far from its native swamps in the delta of the Vosk.

Outlaw 26

I had then heard a repetition of that piteous lengthy scream. I had also seen then, as I had come closer, the small head of the creature, small considering the size of its body, and the span of its wings, lift up above the rence, with its long narrow, toothed jaws, like a long snout or bill, with that long, narrow extension of skin and bome in the back, balancing the weight of the long, narrow jaws, contributing, too, given the creature's weight and general ungainliness in structure, to stability in flight, particularly in soaring. It had emerged from the rence. The creature had turned to regard me. It had opened its wings, suddenly. Their span must have been twenty-five to thirty foot Gorean. Then it closed them, folding them back, against its body. I was quite impressed with it. Never had I been so close to such a thing before. It uttered a hissing, grunting sound, expelling air from its lungs. It had a long, snakelike tail, terminating with a flat, spadelike structure. This tail lashed, the spadelike structure dashing sand about. This tail, with its termination, too, I think, had its role to play in flight, primarily one of increasing stability. Again it opened its wings. These are of skin and stretch from the jointed, hind legs, clawed, of the creature to an extremely long, fourth digit on its clawed hand.

Vagabonds 179

Zarlit Fly

I did see a large, harmless zarlit fly, purple, about two feet long with four translucent wings, spanning about a yard, humming over the surface of the water, then alighting and, on its padlike feet, daintily picking its way across the surface.

Raiders 5

Zeder

Conspicuously absent in the rain forests of the Ua were sleen. There is, however, a sleenlike animal, though much smaller, about two feet in length and some eight to ten pounds in weight, the zeder, which frequents the Ua and her tributaries. It knifes through the water by day and, at night, returns to its nest, built from sticks and mud in the branches of a tree overlooking the water.

Explorers 312

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