174 LONGEVITY OF ANIMALS. 



indications of coming things ; superstitions are 

 wearing out, and shortly will waste away, and be 

 no more heard of; but, I fear, in their place, deism, 

 infidelity, impiety, have started up, the offspring 

 of intuitive wisdom : the first belief arises from 

 weakness and ignorance ; the latter disbelief is 

 ingratitude, pride, wickedness. 



Of the natural duration of animal life it is, from 

 many circumstances, difficult to form an accurate 

 statement, the wild creatures being in great mea- 

 sure removed from observation, and those in a con- 

 dition of domestication being seldom permitted to 

 live as long as their bodily strength would allow. 

 It was formerly supposed that the length of animal 

 life was in proportion to its duration in utero, or 

 the space it remained in the parent from "conception 

 to birth, and the length of time it required to obtain 

 maturity. This notion might have some support 

 in reason and fact, occasionally, but, in many cases, 

 was incorrect, and, in regard to birds, had no foun- 

 dation. Herbivorous animals probably live longer 

 than carnivorous ones, vegetable food being most 

 easily obtainable in all seasons in a regular and 

 requisite supply ; whereas animals that subsist on 

 flesh, or by the capture of prey, are necessitated at 

 one period to pine without food, and at another are 

 gorged with superfluity; and when the bodily 

 powers of rapacious creatures become impaired, 

 existence is difficult to support, and gradually 

 ceases ; but with herbivorous animals in the same 

 condition, supply is not equally precarious, or 



