io8 



THE TWO-TOED ARTIODACTYLA. 



utility of these animals. If, on the one hand, 

 it is unquestionable that the goat must be 

 called on account of its milk the cow of the 

 poor, that it yields, especially in countries 

 where cattle 

 and sheep do 

 not thrive very 

 well, an impor- 

 tant element of 

 food, that the 

 skins are of the 

 highest value, 

 and that cer- 

 tain races, such 

 as the Kash- 

 mir and the 

 Angora Goat 

 (Capra hircus, 

 van angoren- 

 sis), fig. 184, 

 have been 

 brought, in 

 certain moun- 

 tainous coun- 

 tries with a 

 raw climate, by 

 careful in-and- 

 in breeding, to 

 produce an in- 

 valuable kind 

 of long wool, 

 which envel- 

 ops almost the 

 entire body 

 of the animal, 



and is unsur " Fig ' l8s - The Alpine Ibex 



passed for delicacy and softness ; yet it must 

 be confessed, on the other hand, that the 

 goat is the most destructive creature in the 

 world in forests, and that the old seats of 

 civilization, namely the countries round the 

 Mediterranean, owe the destruction of their 

 forests, the nakedness of their mountains, 

 and the inevitable consequence of that con- 

 dition, the dryness of their climate, to the 

 devastations of these animals. Man destroys 



the forests when full-grown in order to pro- 

 cure the timber, the goat prevents their being 

 renewed. It devours the young plants as 

 they spring up out of the ground and the 



young shoots 

 on the trees; 

 wherever the 

 goat comes it 

 makes the 

 work of 



re- 



afforestation 

 an impossibili- 

 ty. It is not 

 without rea- 

 son that a Ger- 

 man legend 

 ascribes the 

 creation of the 

 goat to the 

 devil. The 

 evil spirit is 

 said to have 

 bestowed upon 

 it its horns, its 

 eyes, and its 

 beard, and to 

 have bitten its 

 tail short be- 

 cause it got 

 caught by it 

 in the under- 

 wood. Its 

 influence in 

 lands deprived 

 of trees has 

 been perni- 



(Ibex alpinus). page 109. 



cious enough to justify such a legend. 

 The Ibex. 



The Bouquetins, the steinbocks of German 

 Switzerland (Ibex), are distinguished from 

 the goats proper by the enormous size of 

 their horns. These are triangular in section ; 

 in front they are broad, and on that side 

 there is on each horn a series of transverse 

 ridges. In other respects they are goats. 



