82 
THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY, 
to repair, the mystery was explained, and it turned out, 
that Valiante, (as the Ass was called,) had not only swam 
safely to shore, but without guide, compass, or travel- 
ling map, had found his way from Point de Gat to 
Gibraltar, — a distance of more than two hundred miles, 
through a mountainous and intricate country, intersected 
by streams, which he had never traversed before, and in 
so short a period, that he could not have made one false 
turn. His not having been stopped on the road was attri- 
buted to the circumstance of his having formerly been used 
to whip criminals upon, which was indicated to the pea- 
sants, who have a superstitious horror of such Asses, by 
the holes in his ears, to which the persons flogged were 
tied. 
The Mule 
Is an intermediate creature, springing from the union of 
the male Ass with the Mare, or of the Horse with the fe- 
male Ass, (the former being the best;) and it accordingly 
inherits the small legs and handsome shape of the Horse, 
and the long ears, and cross on the back, which character- 
ize its more humble parent. In obstinacy it surpasses the 
latter; but it is valuable for its sureness of foot, which ena- 
bles it to pass with safety along the most tremendous pre- 
cipices, if left to the guidance of its own instinct. The 
Mu)e is fond of handsome trappings, and is longer lived 
than either the Horse or the Ass. Nature denies it the 
power of continuing its race. In one or two instances, 
however, an exception has occurred to this rule. 
[ To be continued.'] 
INCUBATION. 
A hen has scarcely sat on the egg twelve hours, when 
some lineaments of the head and body of the chicken ap- 
pear. The heart may be seen to beat at the end of the 
second day; it has at that time somewhat of the form of a 
horse-shoe, but no blood yet appears. At the end of two 
days the vesicles of blood are to be distinguished, the 
pulsation of which is very visible: one of them is the left 
ventricle, and the other the root of the great artery. At the 
end of the fiftieth hour, one auricle of the heart appears, and 
resembles a noose folded down upon itself. The beating of 
the heart is first observed in the auricle and afterwards in the 
ventricle. At the end of seventy hours the wings are dis- 
tinguishable; and on the head two bubbles are seen for the 
brain; one for the bill; and two others, for the fore and 
hind part of the head. Towards the end of the fourth day, 
the two auricles, already visible, draw nearer to the heart 
than they did before. The liver appears towards the fifth 
day. At the expiration of one hundred and thirty-four 
hours, the first voluntary motion is observed; in seven 
hours more, the lungs and stomach become visible; and 
four hours after this, the intestines, the loins, and the 
upper jaw. At the hundred and forty- fourth hour, two 
ventricles are discerned, and two drops of blood, instead 
of the single one which was seen before. The seventh 
day, the brain begins to have some consistence. At the 
hundred and ninetieth hour of incubation, the bill opens, 
and the flesh appears in the breast; in four hours more, the 
breast bone is seen; and in six after this, the ribs appear, 
forming from the back; and the bill is plainly seen, as 
well as the gall-bladder. The bill becomes green at the 
end of two hundred and thirty-six hours, and if the chicken 
is taken out of its coverings, it evidently moves itself. 
The feathers begin to shoot out towards the two hundred 
and fortieth hour, and the skull becomes gristly. At the 
two hundred and sixty-fourth, the eyes appear. At the two 
hundred and eighty-eighth, the ribs are perfect. At the 
three hundred and thirty-first, the spleen draws near the 
stomach, and the lungs to the chest. At the end of three 
hundred and fifty-five hours, the bill frequently opens and 
shuts; and at the end of the eighteenth day, the first cry of 
the chicken is heard. It afterwards gets more strength 
and grows constantly, till at length it is enabled to set 
itself free from its confinement. 
In the total of this process must be remarked, that every 
part appears at the appropriate time; if, for example, the 
liver is formed on the fifth day, it is founded on the pre- 
ceding situation of the chicken, and on the changes which 
are to follow. No part of the body could possibly appear, 
either sooner or later, without the whole embryo suffering; 
and each of the limbs becomes visible at the proper mo- 
ment. This ordination, so invariable in its effects, is 
manifestly the work of a supreme Being, whose creative 
powers must be still more sensibly acknowledged, when 
the manner in which the chicken is formed out of the parts 
which compose the egg is also considered; how astonish- 
ing it is that in this there should exist the principles of life: 
that all the parts of an animal’s body should therein be 
concealed, and require nothing but heat to unfold and 
quicken them — that the formation of the bird should be so 
regular — that exactly at the same instant the same changes 
will take place in a great number of eggs — that the chicken, 
when hatched, is heavier than the egg was before. But 
even these are not all the wonders in the production of 
the bird from the egg, (and this instance will serve to illus- 
trate the whole feathered race,) there are others, which, 
