12 GOATS IN CITIES 



exhilarate them. Their spirits rise in proportion to 

 what we should consider the depressing nature of their 

 surroundings. They love to be tethered on a common, 

 with scanty grass and a stock of furze-bushes to 

 nibble. A deserted brickfield, with plenty of broken 

 drain-tiles, rubbish-heaps and weeds, pleases them still 

 better ; but the run of a London stable and stable- 

 yard gives them as much satisfaction as the * liberty ' 

 of a mountain-top. They give quantities of excel- 

 lent milk when kept in this way, are never sick or 

 ' sorry/ and keep the horses interested and free 

 from ennui by their constant visits to the stalls in 

 search of food. 



Not even the pig has so varied a diet as the goat. It 

 consumes and converts into milk not only great quan- 

 tities of garden stuff which would otherwise be wasted, 

 but also, thanks to its love for eating twigs and shoots, 

 it enjoys the prunings and loppings of bushes and trees, 

 which would not be offered to other domestic animals, 

 but which the goat looks upon as exquisite dainties. In 

 old Greece it destroyed the vines, and in modern Greece 

 it has killed off every young tree and bush on the hills 

 till it has disforested the greater part of the Peloponnesus. 

 But the same appetite can be satisfied from an English 

 garden by giving to the goats all the hedge-trimmings, 

 even those of the thorn fences of which cyclists complain 

 so bitterly, and all the prunings of the apple, pear and 



