210 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



the experiment be made ; let two or three males of this 

 ungraceful fpecies, and as many females, be tranfported 

 there, and if, after twenty or more generations, it is 

 found that their number of ribs begins to diminifh, then 

 we fhall acknowledge that the land of America is the 

 mod unhappy, and its climate the mod baneful in all the 

 world. If it happens otherwife, we will fay, as we fhall 

 henceforward fay, that the logic of thefe gentlemen is 

 more contemptible than that quadruped, and that their 

 reafonings are mere paralogifms. In other refpects it is 

 truly to be wondered at in a country where there has 

 been fuch a fcarcity of matter, that nature fliould have 

 made a tranfgrefiion by an excefs of it in the ribs of 

 iloths, and in the toes of oftriches. 



But to {hew that thofe philofophers, while exerting 

 themfelves to fix the character of malignity on the cli- 

 mate of the new world, had totally loft recollection of 

 the miferies of their own continent ; let us alk them 

 what is the mofl: miferable animal in America, they will 

 immediately anfwer, the {loth ; becaufe this animal is 

 the mofl imperfect in its organization, the mofl incapa- 

 ble of motion, the mofl: unprovided with arms for its 

 defence, and above all, that it appears to have lefs fen- 

 fations than any other quadruped ; an animal, truly 

 wretched, condemned by nature to inactivity, lifHefTnefs, 

 famine, and melancholy, by which it continually excites 

 the companion and horror of other fpecies. But this 

 clafs of quadrupeds, fo famous for their mifery, is com- 

 mon to both continents. Count de Bufron will not be- 

 lieve it, becaufe it does not fuit his fyfteni, and fays, that 

 if any fioth is found in Afia, it muft have been tranf- 

 ported there from America ; but whatever he may fay, 

 it is certain, from the atteflations of Kiein, Linnaeus, 



Brtfon, 



