370 MAMMALIA— GOAT. 



even when two of them are linked together, they will leap in such perfect 

 concert as to reach in safety the desired spot. 



The inconstancy of this animal's nature is shown by the irregularity 

 of her actions. She walks, stops short, runs, jumps, advances, retreats, 

 shows, then hides herself, or flies ; and this all from caprice, or without 

 any other determinate cause than her whimsical vivacity. And all the 

 suppleness of the organs, all the nerves of the body, are scarcely suffi- 

 cient for the petulance and rapidity of these motions, which are all 

 natural to her. 



That these animals are naturally fond of mankind, and that in uninhabit- 

 ed places they do not become wild, the following anecdote serves to confirm. 

 In 1698, an English vessel having put into harbor at the island of Bonavista, 

 two negroes presented themselves on board, and offered the English as 

 many goats as they chose to carry away. On the captain manifesting a 

 degree of surprise at this offer, the negroes observed there were but twelve 

 persons in all the island ; that the goats multiplied so fast, that they became 

 troublesome ; and that, far from having any difficulty in taking them, they 

 followed them with a kind of obstinacy, like domestic animals. 



Goats go five months with young, and bring forth at the beginning of the 

 sixth month ; they suckle the young ones for about a month or five Weeks ; so 

 that it may be reckoned about six-and-twenty weeks from the time of their 

 coupling till the time that the young kid begins to eat. The goat generally 

 produces one kid, sometimes two, very rarely three, and never more than 

 four ; and she brings forth young, from a year or eighteen months, to seven 

 years. The knobs in the horns, and their teeth, ascertain their age. The 

 number of teeth is not always the same in female goats ; but they have 

 usually fewer than the male goat, which has also the hair rougher, and the 

 beard and the horns longer. These animals, like oxen and sheep, have four 

 stomachs, and chew the cud. This species is more diffused than the sheep, 

 and goats, like the European, are found in several parts of the world ; only 

 in Guinea and other warm countries they are smaller, but in Muscovy and 

 other cold climates they are larger. 



ROCKY MOUNTAIN GOAT.i 



This animal inhabits the most lofty peaks of the Rocky Mountains, sel- 

 dom descending so near the low countiy as the Rocky Mountain sheep 

 Their manners are said to resemble greatly those of the domestic goat. 

 The exact limits of the range of this animal have not been ascertained, 

 but it probably extends from the fortieth to the sixty-fourth, or sixty-fifth 



1 Capra montana, Odd. 



