CASTRATION. 221 



LETTEE LXXIV. 



TO THE SAME. 



CASTRATION has a strange effect : it emasculates both man, 

 beast, and bird, and brings them to a near resemblance of 

 the other sex. Thus, eunuchs have smooth unmuscular 

 arms, thighs, and legs ; and broad hips, and beardless chins, 

 and squeaking voices. Grelt stags and bucks have hornless 

 heads,* like hinds and does. Thus wethers have small 

 horns, like ewes; and oxen large bent horns, and hoarse 

 voices when they low, like cows : for bulls have short straight 

 horns; and though they mutter and grumble in a deep 

 tremendous tone, yet they low in a shrill high key. Capons 

 have small combs and gills, and look pallid about the head 

 like pullets ; they also walk without any parade, and hover 

 chickens like hens. Barrow-hcgs have also small tusks, 

 like sows. 



Thus far it is plain, that the deprivation of masculine 

 vigour puts a stop to the growth of those parts or appendages 

 that are looked upon as its insignia. But the ingenious 

 Mr. Lisle, in his book on husbandry, carries it much further ; 

 for he says that the loss of those insignia alone has some- 

 times a strange effect on the ability itself. He had a boar 

 so fierce and venereous that, to prevent mischief, orders were 

 given for his tusks to be broken off. No sooner had the 

 beast suffered this injury than his powers forsook him, and 

 he neglected those females to whom before he was passion- 

 ately attached, and from whom no fences could restrain 

 him.f 



* This is not the case if the spermatic cord has been separated. It equally 

 emasculates the animal, but the horns remain as before the operation. ED. 



f 1 I apprehend this remark to be erroneous, as I have known the tusks of 

 many dangerous boars sawn off, for safety, without any such consequence 

 following. I have seen them, however, no longer able to command the 

 monopoly of the sows, as the young boars were no longer afraid of them. 

 MR. SELLS. 



