KINE IN A WILD STATE. 293 



vious. Nature, both liberal and frugal, always does 

 enough to obtain her purpose, but resumes her gifts 

 when no longer useful. This applies particularly to 

 those animals which we merely protect and fatten, 

 without expecting from them any services that re- 

 quire a recollection of the past, anticipation of the 

 futm*e, or, in short, any exercise of those powers 

 which do not, like instinct, operate uniformly, but 

 are rather a kind of borrowed light from the rational 

 powers of the thinking and governing nature. Kine, 

 for instance, in a wild state, possess an acuteness 

 both of sight and smell, and a spirit and fierceness 

 in defending their young, which entirely disappear 

 when, by domestication, we have reduced them to a 

 condition in which the former of these qualities would 

 be of no value, and the latter, dangerous to them- 

 selves and others. In their wild state, they distin- 

 guish by the smell the grass where the footsteps of 

 man are to be traced, and particularly that where 

 any person has sat or lain, with symptoms of the ut- 

 most rage and horror. 



This degradation of the natural instincts is appa- 

 rent in sheep, goats, fowls, &c. In horses and dogs, 

 too, they are much diminished ; but here is a wonderful 

 substitute provided, in that borrowed light formerly 

 mentioned. It is not to feed upon them, but to make 

 their strength, their diligence, their sagacity and at- 



