HISTORY OF VERMONT. 127 



Migration. Animals of every kind when 

 oppressed by hunger, harassed by their ene- 

 mies, or wlien they can find a more comfortable 

 situation, will migrate from one country to an- 

 other. Their migration when chosen and vol- 

 untary, is always with a view to better accorii- 

 modations ; to a situation more favourable for 

 food, growth, and multiplication. Directed by 

 the hand of nature, their natural progress is not 

 to a worse, but to a better situation. They do 

 Jiot leiive their own countr}^, to settle in one less 

 suited to their subsistence, and increase ; but 

 to acquire greater advantages ; an increase of 

 food, numbers, and vigour. Whether the mi- 

 gration of quadrupeds then was from Asia, or 

 from America, there can be no doubt, but that 

 they found in the country to which they repair- 

 ed, a climatC;, soil, and means of subsistence, 

 equally favourable to them, as those which they 

 left. Had there been any very great difference 

 in the provisions, and accommodations of na- 

 ture, in either country, the quadrupeds that 

 could easily migrate, would not have remained, 

 for any considerable time, common to them 

 bodi. Nothing therefore can be less probable, 

 or more contrary to the laws, tendencies, and 

 operations of nature, than the European idea 

 first introduced by M. Buffon, that the quadi'U- 

 peds of Europe migrated into a country in A- 

 merica, where every thing was adapted by na- 

 ture, to their diminution, degradation, and de- 

 crease. Had not the northern parts of Asia, 

 and America, been wxU suited to the subsistence, 

 vigour, and increase of these quadrupeds, there 

 would not have been any voluntaiy mig;ration, 



