72 THE FARMER AT HOME. 



is added. As the beauty of this valuable color is affected, not only by 

 the mode of applying it, but also by the quantity of the ingredients 

 mixed with it, we find various recipes for the preparation of it. The 

 manufacturers which prepare the best carmine carefully conceal the 

 method. The best natural cochineal is formed in Mexico. 



CARNIVOROUS. An epithet generally applied to animals of 

 every description, that subsist for the most part or entirely on animal 

 food. In a more limited sense we understand by carnivorous animals, 

 those only of a savage and voracious nature, assimilating in our ideas 

 some instinctive ferocity of character in the manners of those creatures 

 when seeking and attacking their prey, as well as actually feeding on 

 flesh. We naturally consider, for this reason, among the principal 

 carnivorous animals, the lion, the tiger, and the wolf; or among 

 birds, the eagle, and the kite, with a host of other rapacious crea- 

 tures, upon which nature has bestowed pre-eminent advantages of 

 courage, strength, and arms to aid them in seizing upon, and tearing 

 into pieces, those animals on which they feed ; they have either for- 

 midable canine teeth or fangs ; claws, or talons ; the quadrupeds pos- 

 sessing both, and the birds the latter ; fishes with very few exceptions 

 are carnivorous, but their only offensive weapons are the teeth, or 

 in some species the spines and prickles disposed on various parts of 

 the body. 



It is a dispute among naturalists, whether or not man be naturally 

 carnivorous. Some contend that the fruits of the earth were intended 

 as his sole food ; and that it was necessity in some places, and luxury 

 in others, that first prompted him to feed upon his fellow animals. 

 Pythagoras and his followers looked upon it as a great impiety ; and 

 strictly abstained from all flesh, from the notion of a metempsychoso- 

 sis ; and their successors, the Bramins, continue the same to this 

 day. 



In this, however, as in most other controversies, the truth lies 

 between the two extremes ; there is an obvious connexion between 

 the conformation of the teeth, stomach, and intestines, and the nature 

 of the food upon which an animal subsists ; and according to the 

 rules laid down by comparative anatomists on this subject, man was 

 designed to use a mixed food in common ; but, if circumstances re- 

 quired it, his organs were adapted to digest either animal or vegeta- 

 ble substances. His teeth are neither calculated for grinding coarse 

 vegetable food, nor for tearing the flesh, or breaking the bones of 

 animals. They are only fitted for masticating such matter when 

 divided by machinery or prepared by the operation of heat, in the 

 several processes of cooking. 



CARROT. It is believed that this plant was brought into Europe 

 from the Island of Crete. It was carried to England by the Flemish 

 refugees, during the reign of Elizabeth, and the leaves were then used 

 by ladies in their head dresses at evening parties. The root of the 



