RUMINATING ANIMALS. 



231 



OF 



ANIMA1S. 



CHAPTER XLI. 



INTRODUCTION. 



OF all animals, those that chew the cud 

 are the most harmless, and the most easily 

 tamed. As they live entirely upon vegetables, 

 it is neither their interest nor their pleasure 

 to make war upon the rest of the brute crea- 

 tion ; content with the pastures where they 

 are placed, they seldom desire to change, 

 while they are furnished with a proper sup- 

 ply ; and, fearing nothing from each other, 

 they generally go in herds for their mutual 

 security. All the fiercest of the carnivorous 

 kinds seek their food in gloomy solitude ; 

 these, on the contrary, range together ; the 

 very meanest of them are found to unite in 

 each other's defence ; and the hare itself is 

 a gregarious animal, in these countries where 

 it has no other enemies but the beasts of the 

 forests to guard against. 



As the food of ruminant animals is entirely 

 of the vegetable kind, and as this is very 

 easily procured, so these animals seem natu- 

 rally more indolent and less artful than those 

 of the carnivorous kinds ; and as their appe- 

 tites are more simple, their instincts seem to 

 be less capable of variation. The fox or the 

 welfare for ever prowling ; their long habits 

 of want give them a degree of sharpness and 

 cunning ; their life is a continued scene of 

 stratagem and escape : but the patient ox, or 

 the deer, enjoy the repast that nature has 

 abundantly provided; certain of subsistence, 

 and content with security. 



AB nature has furnished these animals with 



All quadrupeds that chew the cud have suet instead of 

 the soft fat of other, animals.; ,and they have. the. awkward 

 hahhef rising, *hen in a recumbent ^posture, upon .their 

 biud legs:first. A.cow, whetKshe rises from .the.grouudj 



an appetite for such coarse and simple nutri- 

 ment, so she has enlarged the capacity of the 

 intestines, to take in a greater supply. In the 

 carnivorous kinds, as their food is nourishing 

 and juicy, their stomachs are but small, and 

 their intestines short; but in these, whose 

 pasture is coarse, and where much must be 

 accumulated before any quantity of nourish- 

 ment can be obtained, their stomachs are 

 large and numerous, and their intestines long 

 and muscular. The bowels of a ruminating 

 animal may be considered as an elaboratory, 

 with vessels in it, fitted for various transmu- 

 tations. It requires a long and tedious pro- 

 cess before grass can be transmuted into flesh; 

 and for this purpose, nature, in general, has 

 furnished such animals as feed upon grass 

 with four stomachs, through which the food 

 successively passes and undergoes the proper 

 separations.* 



Of the four stomachs with which ruminant 

 animals are furnished, the first is called the 

 paunch, which receives the food after it has 

 been slightly chewed ; the second is called 

 the honeycomb, and is properly notlu'ng more 

 than a continuation of the former : these two, 

 which are very capacious, the animal fills as 

 fast as it can, and then lies down to ruminate; 

 which may be properly considered as a kind 

 of vomiting without effort or pain. The two 

 stomachs above mentioned being filled with 

 as much as they can contain, and the grass, 

 which was slightly chewed, beginning to swell 



'places herself on the fore-knees, and then lifts up the whole 

 hinder parts. A horse springs up first OB ,his .fore-legs, 

 and then rises up his hinder parts. This may Li w.'i:g 

 /to the different conformation of jhe stomach. 



