56 M. F. Cuvier on the Domesticatimi 



ences so prompt, their natural distrust so great, and all their 

 feelings so violent, that it were impossible, by any means what- 

 ever, to confine them to any particular order of circumstances, 

 or habituate them to a determinate situation. Nothing could 

 quiet their desires, which change with all the modifications they 

 experience, and, even to a certain degree, with all the motions 

 that are performed around them : hence we have never been 

 able to count upon any good feehng on their part ; at the mo- 

 ment when they are giving the most striking tokens of affection, 

 they may be induced to tear one with fury ; and there is no 

 treason in this, for all their vicious qualities depend upon their 

 excessive mobility. 



It appears, however, that, by violence, and by continually 

 keeping them in torment, they may be induced to perform cer- 

 tain exercises. It is in this manner that the islanders of Sumatra 

 succeed in teaching the Macacus nemestrirms to ascend trees on 

 being ordered, and collect the fruits ; but it is only individuals 

 that are thus trained, and where force is necessarily employed ; 

 domestication is not yet effected. 



It is in consequence of the same treatment that we see some 

 of these animals, and particularly the magot (Macacus inuus), 

 learn to obey their master, and to perform those adroit and ac- 

 curate leaps, to execute those bold dances which their organiza- 

 tion and their natural dexterity render easy for them, and which 

 often strike us with astonishment. Yet they are so exclusively 

 subjected to force, that, whenever they can escape, they run off, 

 and never appear again, if they happen to be in countries to 

 which they can accommodate themselves, and which are calcu- 

 lated to afford them the means of subsistence. 



We should better succeed in taming the American quadru- 

 mana with pendent tails, such as the ateles, and sapagons, which, 

 to a high degree of intellect and the social instinct, may join an 

 extreme gentleness and a lively desire of being caressed. With 

 regard to the Lemuridae, so many difficulties would be encoun- 

 tered in taming them, and so few advantages obtained, on ac- 

 count of their untractable and timid nature, that the uselessness 

 of making the attempt would have been discovered, had it been 

 tried. And the same remark applies ^o the Insectivora, which 



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