INTRODUCTION. 9 



other nations regarded the hog not only as unfit 

 for food, but even as defiling the person -with 

 whom it came in contact ; yet, from this very 

 prohibition of its flesh, we infer that it was 

 kept in a domesticated state by many tribes, 

 anterior to the time of Moses, though we have 

 no previous notice of it. 



No mention of the cat * occurs in the Scrip- 

 tures ; but with this exception, — and it need 

 scarcely be said, that of the llama, peculiar to 

 the Andes of the American continent, that 

 of the elephant, of the buffalo of India, and of 

 the rein-deer of the arctic circle — all our do- 

 mestic quadrupeds are noticed as being already 

 subdued to man's use anterior to the time of 

 Moses — we may say anterior to the time of 

 Abraham. In this list, we do not include the 

 mule — the hybrid progeny of the ass and. 

 mare, which was, perhaps, not known until a 

 somewhat later period than the remote age of 

 which we are speaking. In fact, the most 

 valuable of our quadrupeds are those which 

 were the first domesticated ; and of this fact, 



* The Egj'ptians certainly had a cat, or small feline animal, 

 domesticated, and, as a painting in the British Museum 

 proves, trained to assist the fowler in catching birds. The 

 painting, with others, was taken from the walls of the grotto 

 in the western hill of Thebes. 



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