236 The IVbite Goat 



always so: the animals did not seem to trespass 

 upon each other's premises. 



These few facts that I have here gathered seem 

 to me worthy of recording, and perhaps enough 

 to warrant a presumption ; but insufficient for an 

 assertion. Until others shall have on their part 

 added similar observations, I would lay down no 

 rule that a chronic hostility separates Ovis and 

 Oreamnus. Perhaps such a rule has been laid 

 down, but if it be printed anywhere, I have not 

 met it ; nor have I had the fortune (after consult- 

 ing the books) to meet any accounts of goat which 

 essentially add to what has been said already by 

 Audubon ; and that is somewhat meagre. Many 

 pictures there are, much better than his old- 

 fashioned plates, but further solid information is 

 uncommonly scarce. Even the latest and most 

 official authorities, when you test their pages by 

 an intimate searching for a piece of comprehensive 

 and definite information, do not give you that 

 information. 



If my surmise be true, and sheep and goat are 

 apt to be upon strained relations, I think we may 

 be certain which of the two has regulated the 

 affair. I will hazard the guess that in single com- 

 bat the goat could ruin the sheep before the 



