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inferior creation, so it was his interest, and his pleasure, to make himself acquainted with their history. It is probable, therefore, that time, which enlarges the sphere of our knowledge in other parts of learning, can add but very little to this. The addition of a new quadruped to the catalogue already known is of no small consequence, and happens but seldom; for the number of all is so few, that wherever a new one is found it becomes an object worthy of our best attention. It may take refuge in its native deserts from our pursuits, but not from our curiosity.

"But it is very different with the inferior ranks of the creation; the classes of birds, of fishes, and of insects, are all much more numerous, and more incompletely known. The quadruped is possessed of no arts of escaping, which we are not able to overcome; but the bird removes itself by its swiftness, the fishes find protection in their native element, and insects are secured in their minuteness, numbers, and variety. Of all these, therefore, we have but a very inadequate catalogue, and though the list be already very large, yet every hour is adding to its extent.

“In fact, all knowledge is pleasant only as the object of it contributes to render man happy, and the services of quadrupeds being so very necessary to him in every situation, he is particularly interested in their history. Without their aid, what a wretched and forlorn creature would he have been! The principal part of his food, his clothing, and his amusements are derived wholly from them, and he may be considered as a great lord, sometimes cherishing his humble dependants, and sometimes terrifying the refractory, to contribute to his delight and conveniences.

"The horse and the ass, the elephant, the camel, the lama, and the reindeer, contribute to ease his fatigues, and to give him that swiftness which he wants from nature. By their assistance, he changes place without labour; he attains health without weariness; his pride is enlarged by the elegance of equipage, and other animals are pursued with a certainty of success. It was happy indeed for man, if while converting these quadrupeds to his own benefit, he had not turned them to the destruction of his fellow creatures; he has employed some of them for the purposes of war, and they have conformed to his noxious ambition with but too fatal an obedience.

"The cow, the sheep, the deer, and all their varieties, are necessary to him, though in a different manner. Their flesh makes the principal luxuries of his table, and their wool or skins the chief ornament of his person. Even those nations that are forbid to touch any thing that has life, cannot wholly dispense with their assistance. The milk of these animals make a principal part of the food of every country, and often repairs those constitutions that have been broken by disease or intemperance.

"The dog, the cat, and the ferret, may be considered as having deserted from their fellow quadrupeds, to list themselves under the conduct and protection of man. At his command they exert all their services against such animals as they are capable of destroying, and follow them into places where he himself wants abilities to pursue.

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As there is thus a numerous tribe that he has taken into protection,

and that supplies his necessities and amusements, so there is also a still more numerous one that wages an unequal combat against him, and thus call forth his courage and his industry. Were it not for the lion, the tiger, the panther, the rhinoceros, and the bear, he would scarcely know his own powers, and the superiority of human art over brutal fierceness. These serve to excite, and put his nobler passions into motion. He attacks them in their retreat, faces them with resolution, and seldom fails of coming off with a victory. He thus becomes hardier and better in the struggle, and learns to know and value his own superiority.

"As the last mentioned animals are called forth by his boldest efforts, so the numerous tribe of the smaller vermin kind excite his continual vigilance and caution; his various arts and powers have been no where more manifest, than in the extirpation of those that multiply with such prodigious fecundity. Neither their agility nor their minuteness can secure them from his pursuits; and though they may infest, they are seldom found materially to injure him.

"In this manner we see, that not only human want is supplied, but the human wit is sharpened by the humbler partners of man in the creation. By this we see, that not only their benefits, but their depredations are useful; and that it has wisely pleased Providence to place us like victors in a subdued country, where we have all the benefit of conquest, without being so secure as to run into the sloth and excess of certain and undisturbed possession. It appears, therefore, that those writers who are continually finding immediate benefit in their production, see but half way into the general system of nature. Experience must every hour inform us, that all animals are not formed for our use; but we may be equally well assured, that those conveniences which we want from their friendship, are well repaid by that vigilance which we procure from their enmity."-Animated Nature, vol. iv. p. 353.]

PART II.-OF BIRDS IN GENERAL.

AFTER quadrupeds, Birds hold the foremost rank in nature. Though they are incapable of the same docility with terrestrial animals, and are less imitative of human perfections, yet they far surpass fishes and insects, both in the structure of their bodies, and their sagacity. As in mechanics the most curious machines are generally the most complicated, so it is in anatomy: the body of man presents the greatest variety upon dissection; quadrupeds, less per

fectly formed, discover it in their simplicity of conformation; the mechanism of birds is still less complex; fishes have yet fewer organs than they; while insects, more imperfectly than all, seem to unite the boundaries between animal and vegetable nature. Of man, the most perfect animal, there are but two or three species; of quadrupeds, the kinds are very numerous; in birds they are still greater; and in insects most of all.

Quadrupeds have some distant resemblance, in their internal structure, with man; but that of birds is entirely dissimilar. This animal seems wholly formed to inhabit the empty regions of air, in order that no part of nature might be left untenanted. Their wings, which are their principal instruments of flight, are formed for this purpose with the greatest exactness, and placed at that part of their body, which best serves to poize the whole, and support it, in a fluid that at first seems so much lighter than itself. The quills are at once stiff and hollow, which gives them the advantage of strength and lightness; the webs are broad on one side and more narrow on the other, both which contribute to the progressive motion of the bird, and the closeness of the wing. Thus each feather takes up a large surface but with inconsiderable gravity, so that when the wing is expanded, the animal becomes specifically lighter than air. The smaller feathers with which it is cloathed, are disposed one over another in the exactest order, so as to lie closer in proportion to the rapidity of the flight. That part of them which is next the skin is furnished with a soft and warm down, and that next the air with a web on each side of the shaft, each single beard of which is itself a feather. All birds that fly much, have their wings placed in the most proper part to balance their bodies in the air; those which have as much occasion for swimming as flying have their wings placed more forward, and those that are

obliged to seek their food by diving, have their legs set more backward, and their wings still more forward than either of the preceding.

But as this lightness of the feathers might frequently be impeded by a shower of rain, or any other accidental moisture, by which means the bird might become an easy prey to every invader, nature has provided an expedient whereby their feathers are as impenetrable to the water, as by their structure they are to the air. All birds in general have a receptacle replenished with oil, something in the shape of a teat, and situated at the extremity of their bodies. This teat has several orifices, and when the bird perceives its feathers to be dry, or expects the approach of rain, it squeezes this teat with the bill, and strains from thence a part of the contained oil; after which, having drawn its bill successively over the greatest part of its feathers, they thus acquire a new lustre, and become impenetrable to the heaviest rains, for the water rolls off in large drops. Such poultry, however, as live for the most part under cover, are not furnished with so large a stock of this fluid as those birds that reside in the open air. The feathers of a hen, for instance, are pervious to every shower; whereas, on the contrary, swans, geese, ducks, and all such as nature has directed to live upon the water, have their feathers dressed with oil from the very first day of their leaving the shell. Thus their stock of this fluid is equal to their necessity of its consumption, Their very flesh contracts a flavour from it, which renders it in some so very rancid as to be utterly unfit for food; however, though it injures the flesh, it improves the feathers for all the domestic purposes to which they are generally converted.

Every part of their mechanism, as was before observed, seems adapted for the improvement of their flight; their bones are extremely light and thin, and their muscles

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feeble, except the large pectoral muscle, by means of which they move their wings with such ease and rapidity. This very strong muscle fills up all that space on each side of the breast bone, which, though small in quadrupeds, is in these large, broad, and externally of a very great surface; by means of this a bird can move its wings with a degree of strength, which, when compared to the animal's size, is almost incredible. No machines that human art can contrive are capable of giving such force to so light an apparatus; and for this reason alone the art of flying must remain one of those perfections which man may desire but can never attain; since, as he increases the force or his machine he must increase its weight also: the tail of birds serves to counterbalance the head and neck, guides their flight instead of a rudder, and greatly assists them either in their ascent, or when descending.

In these particulars birds differ from quadrupeds; yet of the former as well as the latter some live upon the flesh of animals, others upon vegetables, some wholly upon land, and others upon water. This diversity arises in some measure from the peculiar formation of each kind, and not unfrequently from the climate and soil. In all birds of the eagle, or rapacious kind, which live upon flesh, the beak, talons, and stomach are peculiarly formed. The œsophagus, or gullet, in such is found replete with glandulous bodies, which serve to dilute and macerate the prey as it passes into the stomach, which is always very large in proportion to the size of the bird, and generally wrapped round with fat, in order to increase its warmth and powers of digestion. The beaks of these not only serve them as instruments of subsistence, but also as weapons of defence, being crooked at the end, and sometimes serrated at the edges. The talons are large and extremely tenacious, the muscles which contract the claw being infinitely stronger than those

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