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M A M M A L I A. 



parts answering to the two great divisions of organic 

 nature, vegetables and animals. With the former we 

 have, in the mean time, no concern. Our view of 

 the latter must also he principally directed towards 

 one class of animals ; but as that class, the mammalia, 

 are those in which the system of sensation, which is 

 the grand character of animals, and that which at once 

 distinguishes them from vegetables, is most fully de- 

 veloped, their physiology in a great measure includes 

 that of those other classes whose sensation is inferior. 



In the proper, that is the most useful sense of the 

 term, animal physiology is the science of life, or of 

 the investigation of all the phenomena of living beings, 

 and the causes of those phenomena, as far as. such 

 causes are capable of being known. The phenomena 

 are of course as open to our observation in the animal 

 world as they are in the vegetable or the inorganic ; 

 and as they approximate more nearly to our own 

 personal phenomena than the others do, and are also 

 in themselves more striking, they occupy more of our 

 attention, and there is perhaps no individual |of the 

 human race, however uncultivated and however care- 

 less, who is not at some times an animal physiologist. 

 Nor is it at all to be wondered at that such should 

 be the case, for when we come to thnk seriously of 

 it, there is something truly wonderful in an animal ; 

 and if it were possible to imagine a human being 

 possessed of the average degree of intelligence, that 

 had lived to the years of careful observation and calm 

 reflection, without ever having seen an animal, and 

 then to have one brought before him for the first time, 

 it is not easy to find words expressive of the surprise 

 and the delight which such a novelty would produce. 

 All the spectacles and shows, after which the restless 

 minds of the idle and unthinking pant and toil with 

 so much solicitude, would sink into perfect insignifi- 

 cance before this especial wonder ; and the individual 

 in the circumstance which we here suppose would 

 fancy he possessed in the animal a treasure of know- 

 ledge which could not be exhausted. 



We have practical evidence of this in the case and 

 conduct of the young, of simple country people, and 

 of all whose minds have not been debased by that 

 love and pursuit of sensual gratification and frivolity 

 which are the curse of the majority of mankind in all 

 ages, and in none more than in those societies and 

 states of society which lay claim to superior degrees 

 of civilisation and refinement, but in which, in reality, 

 by far the greater majority spend their lives in "sow- 

 ing the wind and reaping the whirlwind." When we 

 observe those unsophisticated persons examining a 

 new animal, that is, an animal new to them, they pre- 

 sent to us a lesson of genuine wisdom, if we, in the 

 pride of our fancied superiority, would but deign to 

 learn it. It is not the unwonted shape or peculiar 

 structure of the animal which rivets their attention, it 

 is " what the animal does" the display of the prin- 

 ciple of life in it the phenomenon of that mysteri- 

 ous power, veiled in its essence from mortal ken, which, 

 generally speaking, makes the mass of matter before 

 their eyes an animal and not any thing else ; and, in 

 its peculiar modification, makes it the particular 

 species of animal before them, and not another. Ask 

 any person of the description alluded to, upon return- 

 ing from a menagerie, or even from a common show 

 of wild beasts at a fair, what he has seen, and the 

 answer will never be concerning modification of shape 

 or diversity of colour ; it will invariably run upon 

 the action'of the animals, and it will be expressed 



with admiration and delight in proportion as that 

 action is novel and energetic. The common exhibit- 

 ors, who address themselves to the least, learned class 

 of the population, are well aware of this, and never 

 fail in turning it to the proper advantage. They plas- 

 ter pictorial representations upon the display canvas 

 in forms which the wildest imagination never fancied, 

 and in altitudes which set every principle of equili- 

 brium at defiance. But though these attract the first 

 gaze of the rustic, they do not constitute the spel! 

 which beg.iiles him of his hard-earned pence, and 

 betrays him within the deceptive booth : there are 

 two short words " all alive" which are the real 

 attraction, and the irresistible desire is to know what 

 shades so marvellous can dn. 



This is an every day and a homely illustration ; 

 but tin? instruction which it is capable of affording, 

 and which it affords largely, is not the less valuable 

 upon this account. It will be remarked too, that 

 in those cases, mammalia always attract more atten- 

 tion than animals of any other class. Birds may be 

 ever so elegant in their shapes, and ever so gay in 

 their colours ; and the folds of serpents may be repre- 

 sented as though they could break bars of iron, and 

 their mouths (some of which are abundantly wide 

 naturally) as much distended as though they could 

 swallow elephants ; but if the rubric presents any 

 novelty in the mammalia, although not larger than a 

 rabbit, and equally simple in its expression, the eye ol 

 the rustic ultimately settles upon that, and it even in 

 its simplicity tempts him more than all the beauties 

 and all the monsters of the other classes of animals, 

 heightened as the latter are by every exaggeration to 

 which a paint brush, unfettered by taste of any de- 

 scription, can have recourse. 



Evidence obtained from sources such as those now 

 mentioned, whatever may be its intrinsic value, is 

 always genuine, being tree from the contamination ol 

 theory and system of every sort. Therefore, whether 

 the distance it carries us be shorter or longer, we can 

 always depend upon it so far as it goes. The speci- 

 men of mammalia, we have said (and any one who 

 chooses to make the observation may verify the say- 

 ing), is the real attraction. Why is it so? This is a 

 simple question, but the answer to it is very important ; 

 it is so because, from what the rustic has already 

 observed in the course of his personal experience, he 

 expects to find a greater display of the phenomena of 

 lite, or of the living principle in that specimen of 

 mammalia than in all the animals of the other classes. 

 This familiar illustration, and we have endeavoured 

 to draw it from a source as little connected with arti- 

 ficial learning as possible, is certainly the most sin- 

 cere, and far from the least convincing proof of the 

 superior interest and value of physiology (we mean 

 animal physiology) that could be adduced. 



When we come to this department of study we 

 find that we are upon new ground, and that there is 

 something in addition to all that we meet with in 

 mere matter and its laws, which those laws will not 

 explain. The unorganised body, under what form 

 soever it may exist, is wholly under the government 

 of the laws of matter, which laws we can reduce to 

 mathematical proportions in their different instances, 

 and state them by weight or measure ; and whenever 

 one substance of this kind acts upon another, or two 

 act jointly, so as to prpduce a new substance by their 

 union, the whole materials of that new substance are 

 ready prepared before the act of union, and after that 



