MOOSE-DEEB. 119 



the chief external sexual distinction in many birds, these 

 colours do not take place till sexual attachments begin to 

 obtain. And the case is the same in quadrupeds, among 

 whom, in their younger days, the sexes differ but little ; but, 

 as they advance to maturity, horns and shaggy manes, beards 

 and brawny necks, &c., &c., strongly discriminate the male 

 from the female. We may instance still farther in our own 

 species, where a beard and stronger features are usually 

 characteristic of the male sex ; but this sexual diversity does 

 not take place in earlier life ; for a beautiful youth shall be 

 so like a beautiful girl, that the difference shall not be 

 discernible : 



Quern si puellarum insereres choro, 

 Mire sagaces falleret hospites 

 Discrimen obscurum, solutis 



Crinibus, ambigudque vultu." HOR. 



If he were by girls surrounded, 

 Strangers soon would be confounded : 

 Manhood's form could no one trace 

 In his beardless female face. 



LETTEE XXXYI. 



TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ. 



SELBORNE, Aug. 1, 1770. 



DEAB SIB, The French, I think, in general, are strangely 

 prolix in their natural history. "What Linnaeus says with 

 respect to insects holds good in every other branch : " Ver- 

 bositas prcesentis steculi, calamitas artis" 



Pray how do you approve of Scopoli's new work? As I 

 admire his Entomologia, I long to see it. 



I forgot to mention in my last letter (and had not room 

 to insert in the former) that the male moose, in rutting 

 time, swims from island to island, in the lakes and rivers of 

 North America, in pursuit of the females. My friend, the 

 chaplain, saw one killed in the water, as it was on that 

 errand, in the river St. Lawrence : it was a monstrous beast, 

 .he told me ; but he did not take the dimensions. 



