192 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



The firft ground of difparagement to America, with 

 the count de BufFon, is the fmall number of its quadru- 

 peds, compared with thofe of the old continent. He 

 reckons two hundred fpecies of quadrupeds hitherto dis- 

 covered over all the globe, of which one hundred and 

 thirty belong to the old continent, and only feventy to 

 the new world. And if we take from this number the 

 fpecies which are common to both continents, we fhall 

 hardly find, he fays, forty fpecies of quadrupeds pro- 

 perly American. From thefe premifes he infers that in 

 America there has been a great fcarcity of matter (a). 



But why would he take from the feventy fpecies of 

 quadrupeds America has, thofe thirty which are com- 

 mon to both continents, as they, from their very ancient 

 habitation in thofe countries, are as much American as 

 the others ? Befides, if thofe animals, which he calls 

 properly American, had been created originally in Ame- 

 rica, with greater (hew of probability he might have af- 

 firmed the fuppofed fcarcity of matter in that part of 

 the world. But all beads having been Afiatic in their 

 origin, as he himfelf confeffes, we do not fee his grounds 

 for drawing fuch a conclufion. " Every animal," fays 

 BufFon, " when abandoned to its own inflinft, feeks a 

 zone and a region adapted to its nature (b)." Hence 

 the caufe of the fmall number of fpecies of quadrupeds 

 in America ; becaufe, upon fuppofition that animals af- 

 ter the deluge, when abandoned to their own inftincl, 

 fought a zone and a region fuitable to their natures, and 

 found it in the countries of the old continent, they had 

 no occafion to make fo long a journey as to America : if 

 the animals, inftead of being faved on the mountains of 



Armenia, 



0) Hift. Nat. torn, xxiii. 



(£) Ibid. torn. xxix. 



