LONGEVITY OF ANIMALS. 175 



wholly denied. Yet it is probable that few animals 

 in a perfectly wild state live to a natural extinction 

 of life. In a state of domestication, the small num- 

 ber of carnivorous creatures about us are sheltered 

 and fed with care, seldom are in want of proper 

 food, and at times are permitted to await a gradual 

 decay, continuing as long as Nature permits, and 

 by such attentions many have attained to a great 

 age ; but this is rather an artificial than a natural 

 existence. Our herbivorous animals, being kept 

 mostly for profit, are seldom allowed to remain 

 beyond approaching age ; and when its advances 

 trench upon our emoluments, by diminishing the 

 supply of utility, we remove them. The uses of 

 the horse, though time may reduce them, are often 

 protracted ; and our gratitude for past services, or 

 interest in what remains, prompts us to support his 

 life by prepared food of easy digestion, or requiring 

 little mastication ; and he certainly by such means 

 attains to a longevity probably beyond the contin- 

 gencies of Nature. I have still a favourite pony 

 for she has been a faithful and able performer of 

 all the duties required of her in my service for 

 upwards of two-arid-twenty years and, though 

 now above five-and-twenty years of age, retains all 

 her powers perfectly, without [any diminution, or 

 symptom of decrepitude : the fineness of limb, 

 brilliancy of eye, and ardour of spirit, are those of 

 the colt ; and, though treated with no remarkable 

 care, she has never been disabled by the illness of a 



