hitherto met with the same fostering care in the establish- 

 ed Universities of Britain, it embraces the consideration 

 of a series of beings, whose relations to the wants and 

 comforts of man, are not less numerous and important 

 than those of Plants, and it has long been cultivated with 

 advantage and success in the Universities of France, 

 Italy, and Germany. Whether, indeed, we consider Ani- 

 mals as affording to man materials for the maintenance 

 and growth of the body, or medicines to prevent, alle- 

 viate, or remove its diseases, or clothing to protect his 

 frame against the vicissitudes of temperature, and the 

 inclemencies of the seasons, or physical power to aid 

 him in the operations of art, or protection against the at- 

 tacks and depredations of foes, or ornaments to please and 

 cultivate his taste, or luxuries to gratify the sense, or know- 

 ledge extensively applicable to his necessities and enjoy- 

 ments, or an endless source of intellectual amusement and 

 gratification, their study forms a department of knowledge 

 which yields to no other in its immediate importance to the 

 existence and happiness of man. 



The form and disposition of the human teeth, the struc- 

 ture of the digestive organs, the natural instincts and appe- 

 tites, and the results of constant and universal experience, 

 show that man was designed to subsist partly on animal 

 flesh ; and almost every class of animals supplies him with 

 abundant and wholesome food. The whole class of Quad- 

 rupeds, and almost every part of their body, the muscles, 

 the brain and spinal cord, the lungs, the heart, the stomach 

 and intestines, the liver and pancreas, the kidneys, the ute- 

 rus, the placenta and udder, the skin, the fat, the marrow 

 and gelatinous substance of the bones, the blood, and the 

 milk, are used as alimentary substances. All the species 

 of Birds, and their eggs, afford a wholesome nutriment to 

 man, and even their nests are sometimes used as articles of 

 food. The flesh and the eggs of many species of Reptiles, 

 form also esteemed and highly nutritious articles of food. 

 Several kinds of turtles, as the Testudo ferox, Lin. which 



