New Institution /or the Promotiun of Zoology. 67 



and aviaries may be formed, and where such quadrupeds, 

 birds, and fishes, as are imported by the Society, should be 

 placed for ascertaining their uses, their power of increase or 

 improvement. — 2dly, Sufficient accommodation for the mu- 

 seum should be provided in the metropolis, with a suitable 

 establishment, so conducted as to admit of its extension, on 

 additional means being afforded. — It is presumed that a num- 

 ber of persons would feel disposed to encourage an institution 

 of this khid; it is therefore proposed to make the annual sub- 

 scription from each individual only two pounds, and the ad- 

 mission-fee three pounds. The members, of coui'se, will have 

 free and constant access to the collection and grounds, and 

 might, at a reasonable price, be furnished with living speci- 

 mens, or the ova of fishes and birds. 



When it is considered hovi- i'ew amongst the immense vai'iety 

 of animated beings have been hitherto applied to the uses of 

 man, and that most of those which have been domesticated or 

 subdued belong to the early periods of society, and to the 

 efforts of savage or uncultivated nations *, it is impossible not to 

 hope for many new, brilliant, and useful results in the same 

 field, by the application of the wealth, ingenuity, and varied 

 resources of a civilized people. 



It is well known, that, with respect to most of the animal 

 tribes, domestication is a process which requires time, and 

 that the offspring of wild animals, raised in a domestic state, 

 are more easily tamed than their parents ; and in a certain 

 number of generations the effect is made permanent, and con- 

 nected with a change, not merely in the habits, but even in the 

 nature, of the animal. Even migration may be, in certain 

 cases, prevented ; and the wildest animals, supplied abundantly 

 with food, lose the instinct of locomotion, their offspring acquire 

 new habits, and a breed, fairly domesticated, is with difficulty 

 brought back to its original state. 



Should the Society flourish and succeed, it will not only be 

 useful in common life, but would likewise promote the best 

 and most extensive objects of the scientific history of animated 

 nature, and offer a collection of living animals, such as never 

 yet existed in ancient or modern times. The present mena- 

 geries of Europe are devoted to objects of curiosity. Home, 

 at the period of her greatest splendour, brought savage mon- 

 sters from every quarter of the world then known, to be shown 



• We owe the peacock ami common fowl to the natives of India; most 

 of our races of cattle, anil swans, geese, ducks, to the aborigines of Eu- 

 rope; the turkey, to the natives of America ; the (niinea-fowl, to those o( 

 Africa. The pike and carp, witli son.c otiier fishes were probably intro.- 

 duccd bv the monks. 



I 2 in 



