266 
PASSIONAL ZOOLOGY. 
made of sheepskin burst at a distance from the mere sound pro- 
duced by a drum made of wolfskin. 
The ancients attributed to the emanations of the wolf the power 
of causing mares to miscarry, and of rendering heifers sterile. In 
the Egyptian hieroglyphics, barrenness is figured by a mare tread- 
ing a wolf under foot. 
The prophets of the Holy Scriptures frequently compare the 
wolf to* rapacious tyrants, to the kings of Syria and Babylon. 
The analogy would be more exact between the wolf and the rebel 
who braves tyranny. 
The simple natural history of the wolf was already loaded with 
crimes enough without its being necessary to blacken it farther 
with imaginary crimes. The wolf eats man and the animals dear 
to man. This suffices to justify the hatred declared against him. 
The wolf eats man, it is true, but who has accustomed the wolf 
to feed on human flesh, but man himself ; man who, for so many 
ages collects the carnivoi’ous animals to the provision of his battle- 
fields ? But the wolves do not kill each other for food, and they 
have always this terrible argument to cast in the teeth of man, 
who kills and eats his fellow man. 
I defy history to cite a crime of any beast of which man has 
not first set the example. Man invents, the animal copies. Con- 
sult the history of the celebrated wolves of France; it swarms 
with proofs in support of this great truth. 
The chronicles of the ninth century mention a terrible invasion 
of maddened wolves, which ravaged the country in 878. This was 
the time when the Normans covered France with blood and fu- 
nerals. 
The wolves which invaded France in 1814, came in the suite of 
the Russian and German armies which the gold of England had 
combined against us. 
But even if the wolf devoured man de proprio motu, what would 
that prove against the educability of the wolf, and against his nat- 
ural good feelings ? 
The dog also eats man when man trains him to it. There are 
even some with a very decided appetite for human flesh, and who 
love their master like a beefsteak. 
