Andrew Scharlael, age 13, of San Francisco, Calif., for his question:

 Where is the native home of the aardvark?

The aardvark is a native of Africa, and nowhere else in the world do we find him in the wild state. He ranges from Ethiopia to the Sudan and lives also on the grassy veldt lands of South Africa. It was in South Africa that the Dutch settlers found him and named him aardvark, the Earth pig. The bulky fellow is four feet long, plus another two feet of tapering tail, and he is not related to any member of the pig family.

However, the aardvark grunts and squeals somewhat like a pig, and this Earth pig of Africa certainly burrows in the Earth. When threatened, he can burrow faster than a man with a spade can dig him out. The strange animal has a small round mouth from which he extends a whiplash tongue 18 inches long. His strong claws are used to dig out the termites that abound in his range, and the whip tongue is used to gather them up for dinner.