INTIIODL'CTION. , 51 



naturalists ; and yet most of the phenomena observed in 

 our domestic animals calculated to excite wonder, and 

 frequently to create doubt, however true, mainly depend 

 on it. That the intellectual powers are capable of 

 cultivation, in both the animal and his progeny, ap- 

 pears from numerous facts we daily witness. The 

 fear of man, now so general among animals, is only a 

 cultivated quality, if credit is to be given to numerous 

 accounts related by travellers. Gmelin informs us, 

 that the foxes in Siberia came readily towards him. 

 BoUGANviLLE relates the same of the animals in the 

 Falkland islands. The first European visiters to Dusky 

 Bay, in New Zealand, were surrounded by birds, who 

 settled on them, and became an easy prey to the cats 

 on board their ships. Among ourselves, in districts 

 where game is strictly preserved, the pheasants, par- 

 tridges, and hares, feed close around us. The fearless- 

 ness of the robin, wien, martin, and swallow, arises 

 from a traditional consciousness that they are never in- 

 terrupted: our sparrows and rooks, on the contrary, 

 learn to avoid man as a constant enemy, and can dis- ^ 

 tinguish when he is armed with a gun, almost as soon 

 as they are out of the nest. The pointing and setting of 

 our sporting dogs is a property common to every kind 

 of dog ; but it is improved and cultivated in these im- 

 mediate breeds to a particular purpose. This property 

 descends with the race, in some instances, so perfectly, 

 as to require in the descendants no breaking or train- 

 ing. Nature undoubtedly gave to the original dog all 

 the ferocity so usually met with in the English mastiff; 

 but the determined perseverance in battle, the contempt 

 of pain, danger, and death, that characterize the bull- 

 dog, is wholly a cultivated quality. It is the same in 

 our game fowls ; for in the East, from whence they are 

 derived, they arc not courageous. From all that has 



