HISTORY. 15 



countries of the Euphrates, into Arabia, and, with some slight 

 change of characters, into Upper Egypt and Nubia. This 

 kind of Goat was known to the ancients, who mention it by 

 the name of the Syrian, and sometimes of the Damascus Goat. 

 It is generally without horns, has the face singularly con- 

 vex, long pendulous ears, delicate limbs, and short hair, 

 usually brown. The mammae of the females hang almost to 

 the ground. These Goats are more docile than any other, 

 and, yielding a large quantity of milk, are greatly valued in 

 the arid countries over which they are spread. The same 

 form of the Goat appears in Hindostan, and doubtless in 

 other countries of Eastern Asia. In Nepaul a beautiful Goat 

 is domesticated, which so much resembles the Syrian that 

 both appear to be derived from a common stock. It is of a 

 slender form, with a convex face, without horns, and with 

 long pendulous ears, which are generally white, or of a paler 

 tint than the rest of the body. 



Africa abounds in Goats as well as Sheep. Along the 

 Barbary coast, the Goats are very fine, resembling those of 

 Greece, and other countries of the Mediterranean. From this 

 country the Romans derived their choicest breeds. But 

 southward of the mountains which bound the great basin 

 of the Mediterranean, Nature presents a new aspect, and 

 beyond the great Sahara, every living thing, up to man him- 

 self, seems changed. But of the Goats of the interior we 

 learn little from the casual notices of travellers. We are 

 told only that Goats are very numerous, and often so nearly 

 resemble Sheep, that the one might be mistaken for the other. 

 On the coasts of Guinea, however, the cruel visits of Europeans 

 have made us acquainted with a race of Goats, which differ 

 from any other known to us. They are of diminutive size, very 

 pretty, with short pricked-up ears, and generally with slender 

 falcated horns. They have been carried by the slave-ships 

 to the settlements of the Spaniards and Portuguese in Ame 

 rica, and to the West India Islands, and they have multiplied 

 and remained distinct from the other races. 



