500 HISTORY OF 



inches ; the height of the fore-leg, from the ground to tlic top 

 of the shoulder, was ten feet ; from the shoulder to the top of 

 the head was seven ; the height of the hind-leg was eight feet 

 five inches ; and from the top of the shoulder to the insertion 

 of the tail was just seven feet long. 



No animal, either from its disposition, or its formation, seems 

 iess fitted for a state of natural hostility ; its horns are blunt, 

 and even knobbed at the ends ; its teeth are made entirely for 

 vegetable pasture ; its skin is beautifully speckled with brown 

 spots, upon a whitish ground ; it is timorous and harmless, and, 

 notwithstanding its great size, rather flies from, than resists, the 

 slightest enemy ; it partakes very much of the nature of the 

 camel, which it so nearly resembles ; it lives entirely upon vege 

 tables, and when grazing, is obliged to spread its fore-legs very 

 wide in order to reach its pasture ; its motion is a kind of pace, 

 two legs on each side moving at the same time, whereas in other 

 animals they move transversely. It often lies down with its 

 belly to the earth, and, like the camel, has a callous substance 

 upon its breast, which, when reposed, defends it from injury. 

 This animal was known to the ancients, but has been very rarely 

 seen in Europe. One of them was sent from the East to the 

 Emperor of Germany, in the year 1559; but they have often 

 been seen tame at Grand Cairo in Egypt; and, I am told, there 

 are two there at present. When ancient Rome was in its splen- 

 dour, Ponipey exhibited at one time no less than ten upon the 

 theatre. It was the barbarous pleasure of the people, at that 

 time, to see the most terrible, and the most extraordinary ani- 

 mals, produced in combat against each other. The lion, the 

 lynx, the tiger, the elephant, the hippopotamus, were all let 

 loose promiscuously, and were seen to inflict indiscriminate de- 

 struction.* 



* TIio absonce of the r amclopard or eiraffc from E\iropo, for three cen. 

 tiirics and a half, uaturally induced a belief that the descriptions of this ani- 

 mal were in great part fabulous — that a creature of such extraordinary 

 height and apparent disproportions was not to be found amongst the actual 

 works of natiu-e; and that it more properly belonged to the group of chi- 

 meras with which the regions of imagination are tenanted, — the luiicorns, 

 and sphinxes, and satjrs, and cynocephali, of ancient poets and naturalifts. 



Buffon, and other zoologists, fell into the common error of describing the 

 giiaffe as. having liis fore legs tvvict^ as long as liis Iiind. It was not till 

 witlviu the last forty years that we obtained any very precise notions of the 

 form and habits of the giraflcj aud we principally owe them to Le ViiillaDt, 



