SPECIES AND VARIETY. 225 



dentity of form and endowments. Every work of art, such 

 as statues, paintings, sculptures ; and the actual relics, in 

 tombs, mummies, &c.; all corroborate the proof*. 



These remarks are chiefly applicable to wild animals^ 

 which remain in places most congenial to their nature ; 

 where the climate, seasons, air, soil, supply of food, cor- 

 respond to their organization, economy, and wants. Some 

 of these, however, are capable of enduring greater diversity 

 of situation than others ; and hence are exposed to consi- 

 derable differences in various external agencies. *' The 

 wolf and the fox/' says Cuvier f, " are found from the 

 torrid zone to tigh northern latitudes ; but, in this wide 

 extent, the principal difference is a little more or less 

 beauty in the fur. I have compared the crania of northern 

 and Egyptian foxes with those of France, and have found 

 only individual differences. Wild animals confined within 

 narrower limits, particularly those of the carnivorous order, 

 vary still less. A fuller mane is the only circumstance 

 distinguishing the hyena of Persia from that of Morocco." 



Variations in the quantity and quality ^of food may cause 

 some slight differences : thus the tusks of elephants, or the 

 horns of the deer kind, may be larger or longer where the 

 aliment is more abundant and nutritious. 



There are, however, many animals which are no longer 

 in their natural wild state, having been domesticated or 

 reduced to slavery by man. Here the original form is no 

 longer strictly preserved : deviations take place in size, 

 colour, form, proportions, and qualities ; and the degree of 



* " I have carefully examined the figures of animals and birds engraven 

 on the numerous obelisks brought from Egypt to ancient Rome. In the 

 general character, which is all that can have been preserved, these repre- 

 sentations perfectly resemble the originals, as we now see them. My learned 

 colleague, Mr. Geoffroy St. Hillaire, collected numerous mummies of 

 animals from the sepulchres and temples of Upper and Lower Egypt. He 

 brought away cats, ibises, birds of prey, dogs, monkeys, crocodiles, and an 

 ox's head embalmed. There is no more dilTerence between these relics and 

 the animals we are now acquainted with, than between human mummies 

 and the skeletons of the present day." — Cuvier, Recherches siir les 

 Ossemens Fossiks; i. Disc. Prelim, p. 80. 

 t Ibid. p. 75. 



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