176 CLASS AVES. , 



crossing the breeds, and employing individuals of the distinct 

 and foreign species. 



Many of the birds which compose the gallinaceous order, 

 appear less difficult to be brought to unite with strange 

 species than those of any other order. In none do we 

 observe productions equally singular and equally various. 

 From the great majority of the pheasants, mongrels may 

 thus be produced ; all the hoccos will couple together in a 

 state of domestication, the pheasant will ally with the cock ; 

 this last with the turkey, with which the hoccos born in the 

 domestic state will also unite. It appears, in fact, very 

 possible to produce mongrels from the major part of those 

 gallinae, which are susceptible of domestic cultivation. 



It remains to inquire whether any true species of gallus 

 are native to America in the wild state ; and whether the cocks 

 which are found in the solitary forests of the southern division 

 of that mighty continent, do not derive their origin from 

 those which were transported from the old world, as well as 

 those which the Indians rear around their dwellings. 



There appear no very particular reasons for rejecting the 

 possibility of the existence of wild cocks in America. It 

 cannot be said that since these birds inhabit India, China, 

 and the Islands of the Eastern Archipelago, in a state of 

 freedom, it must follow that America possesses none of them 

 in the same state. The relations of creditable travellers, and 

 of ocular witnesses, cannot permit us to doubt of the veracity 

 of what they have advanced, until better founded proofs, 

 and more recent observations, shall oblige us to reject it. 



The Jesuit Acosta is the first who assures us that hens 

 existed in Peru before the arrival of the Spaniards, and that 

 they were called, in the language of the country, Talpa, and 

 their eggs Ponta. 



M. Sonnini thus expresses himself on the subject : — " Tra- 



