SHEEP AND GOAT KIND. 53 



seldom fail of guiding us to the kind j and we 

 might almost upon sight tell which belong to the 

 deer kind, and which are to be degraded into that 

 of the goat. However, the annually shedding the 

 horns in the deer, and the permanence in the 

 sheep, draws a pretty exact line between the 

 kinds ; so that we may hold to this distinction 

 only, and define the sheep and goat kind as ru- 

 minant animals of a smaller size, that never shed 

 their horns.* 



If we consider these harmless and useful ani- 

 mals in one point of view, we shall find that both 

 have been long reclaimed, and brought into a 

 state of domestic servitude. Both seem to re- 

 quire protection from man, and are in some mea- 

 sure pleased with his society. The sheep, indeed, 

 is the more serviceable creature of the two ; but 

 the goat has more sensibility and attachment. 

 The attending upon both was once the employ- 

 ment of the wisest and the best of men ; and 

 those have been ever supposed the happiest times 

 in which these harmless creatures were consider- 

 ed as the chief objects of human attention. In 

 the earliest ages the goat seemed rather the greater 

 favourite, and indeed it continues such in some 

 countries to this day among the poor. However, 

 the sheep has long since become the principal 

 object of human care ; while the goat is disre- 

 garded by the generality of mankind, or become 



[* The horns of the sheep are concave, turned backwards, and full of 

 wrinkles ; those of the goat are hollow, but turned upwards, erect, and sca- 

 brous. Both animals have eight fore-teeth in the tinder jaw, but none in 

 the upper ; and they have no dog-teeth. The male goat has a long beard.J 



