128 RUMINANTIA. 



prostate, or whether the small glandular substance at the beginning 

 of the urethra as described above is the true prostate, is not easy to 

 determine. 



The penis is long and small, terminating in a point ; when not erect, 

 it is bent upon itself near to the bulb : this is done by two small 

 muscles which arise from the sides of the hollow of the sacrum, cross 

 the rectum obliquely, get to the bulb and approach one another, and 

 are inserted into the penis at the bend next to the glans. 



[Suborder Ruminantia.~\ 



Of Ruminants. 



There is perhaps no class of animals more marked than the Rumi- 

 nants, and perhaps few classes more extensive. Everything that 

 relates to nourishment has a uniformity that runs through the whole. 

 The generative parts in all have a great similarity. 



A great and constant characteristic of this class of animals, is their 

 having no fore-teeth in the upper jaw 1 ; three reservoirs to, or preceding, 

 the true stomach, which makes four in the whole; a long straight 

 caecum ; the beginning of the colon making spiral turns upon itself, 

 with the last turn following the track of the small intestines; and 

 cotyledons to the uterus 2 . 



They are of a great variety of genera, each of which are divisible 

 into their species, and those into endless varieties; especially those 

 species that have been civilized, or what are called domesticated ; most 

 of which have been so more or less, being, to man, one of the mosl 

 useful classes of animals we are acquainted with ; whether we view 

 them in regard to food, covering, or as affording light when the sun fails 

 us. Their size also, stamps a value on them and all their productions. 

 In the light of food, their utility is very extensive, arising out of the 

 arrangements of civil society ; first, we feed on those offspring which 

 would become too numerous if preserved, and then we take the advan- 

 tage of the natural food of such offspring, viz. the milk ; making that 

 into various forms of nutriment, adapted for preservation, which renders 

 its use very extensive. 



The cow is of the first importance in the height of civilization ; the 

 sheep, the goat, (fee. are subservient to the same purposes in less 

 civilized nations. 



1 [The Camelida? retain a pair of canine-shaped incisors in the preniaxillary 

 bones.] 



* [The same annectent family resembles the Suicla? in the absence of cotyledons.] 



