Domesticity in Animals . 
707 
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animals capable of domestication belong to their so-called 
“ Rasorial type.” Swainson himself writes : — “ It seems to 
have been ordained by Almighty Wisdom that there should 
be one type above all others whose powers were to be more 
especially devoted to man, and which should evince an apti- 
tude and a disposition to submit to his dominion far above 
all other created things. This is the grand characteristic 
of all rasorial types among the more perfectly formed verte- 
brate animals, whose size or structure are in any way 
adapted to answer the end proposed. . . . The ungulated 
quadrupeds ( Ungulata ) and the rasorial order of birds which 
show the highest intelligence, the greatest docility, and the 
most cheerful contentment under the domestication of man. 
. . . All our quadrupeds of burden or of food are taken 
from the Ungulata. . . . The dog is a rasorial type of the 
Ferce. . . . The common duck, though a natatorial bird, is 
yet the rasorial type of its own family. . . . The hymen- 
opterous order of the winged insects is, in its own circle, 
a rasorial type, and we thus find that the ants (?) and the 
bees, the most useful inserts to man and the most intelligent 
and social of annulose animals represent the ruminating 
quadrupeds and the gallinaceous birds.”* 
We are thus to learn that certain animals have been 
divinely pre-ordained for domestication. These, accordingly, 
man has succeeded in taming, whilst if he has attempted the 
subjugation of any other species he has failed. 
We will not in reply call in question Swainson’s entire 
classification of animals, built as it is upon outward struc- 
ture only, and with an avowed disregard of internal anatomy 
and of embryology. Such a criticism would take us too far, 
and would in these days be a mere re-slaying of the slain. 
On this point we will merely remark that it was perfe(5tly 
easy for Mr. Swainson, by his representative system, to refer 
a species to any type or “ circle” which happened to be 
convenient. 
We will in our reply adhere to plain fadts. If the Rasores 
and their representatives have been especially adapted for 
domestication, why do so many of them remain outside the 
pale ? We may take as an instance the common pheasant 
and certain allied species. These birds undoubtedly belong 
to the order Rasores, and even to the same family which 
includes the common fowl. The delicacy of their flesh has 
been a strong inducement to man to reduce them to com- 
* W. Swainson. Geography and Classification of Animals (in Lardner’s 
Cabinet Cyclopaedia), p. 258. 
