SHEEP AND GOAT KIND. 26? 



favourite food is the tops of the boughs, or the 

 tender bark of young trees ; it seems less afraid 

 of immoderate heat, and bears the warm climates 

 better than the sheep ; it sleeps exposed to the 

 sun, and seems to enjoy its warmest fervours ; 

 neither is it terrified at the storm, or incommod- 

 ed by the rain ; immoderate cold alone seems 

 to affect it, and is said to produce a vertigo, 

 with which this animal is sometimes incommod- 

 ed. The inconstancy of its nature is perceivable 

 in the irregularity of its gait ; it goes forward, 

 stops, runs, approaches, flies, merely from caprice, 

 and with no other seeming reason than the ex- 

 treme vivacity of its disposition. 



There are proofs of this animal's being naturally 

 the friend of man, and that the goat seldom re- 

 sumes its primeval wildness when once reduced 

 into a state of servitude. In the year 1698, an 

 English vessel happening to touch at the islands 

 of Bonavista, two Negroes came, and offered the 

 sailors as many goats as they chose to take away. 

 Upon the captain's expressing his astonishment 

 at this offer, the Negroes assured him that there 

 were but twelve persons in the island, and that 

 the goats were multiplied in such a manner as 

 even to become a nuisance : they added, that in- 

 stead of giving any trouble to catch them, they 

 followed the few inhabitants that were left with a 

 sort of obstinacy, and rather became importunate 

 with their tameness. 



The goat produces but two at a time, and 

 three at the most. But in the wanner climates, 

 although the animal degenerates, and grows less, 



