42 
FIRST CLASS OF THE VERTEBRATED ANIMALS. 
both feeble and defenceless, Nature has converted tho ordinary hair of the other 
quadrupeds into a forest of pointed darts; and these animals, rolling themselves into a 
spiny ball on the approach of danger, are invincible to all other species. The herbi- 
vorous tribes do not possess strong teeth or hooked claws, but many of them have 
the head armed with powerful horns. The timid Rodentia either seek with instinc- 
tive industry to hide themselves under ground, like the IMarmot, tho Rabbit, and the 
Rat, or they leap with agility, like the Squirrel, from tree to tree, or else, like the 
Jerboas and Cape Rat, they avoid their pursuers by wide and frequent springs resem- 
bling Grasshoppers ; again, the Vicugna and Llama have no means of defence, yet when 
attacked they dart upon their enemies an acrimonious and disgusting saliva. Tho 
Pole-cats and the Mephitis exhale, when pursued, odours so execrable, that they 
compel their most irritated enemy to desist in his pursuit. Some animals, like the 
Howling Sapajous (Aides and Lagolhtix), attempt to terrify their enemies by the 
most frightful howls ; others avoid them by climbing trees, by darting into their sub- 
terranean retreats, by vaulting, by leaping, by plunging into the water, by distracting 
their pursuer with a host of ingenious devices and precautions, or by the construction 
of fortified dens or impenetrable recesses. 
Besides these means of defence, the smaller species are more productive, both in 
number and frequency, than the larger species; they arc also more robust, lively, and 
active, in proportion. Before an Elephant or a Wliale can turn round once, a Mus- 
cardin or a Mouse will have made a hundred movements. The smallness of their 
limbs gives more unity and solidity to their bodies. Their shorter muscles contract 
more easily, and more forcibly, than in these larger and more unwieldy machines. 
Were an animal to exist three or four hundred feet in length, and of a proportionate 
thickness, it would lie gasping on the earth overwhelmed with its weight, and would 
become the easy prey of all other animals, even of the most feeble. 
Thus we find that the Mammalia are fitted in every respect for the stations which 
they occupy, and that a bountiful Nature provides, by means of their complicated 
relations, for one continual scene of activity and enjoyment. 
GENERAL REVIEW OF THE MAMMALIA CONTINUEE. 
Their Food Carnivorous Tribes — Final causes of their Mul^lal Destruction — 
Herbivorous Tribes. 
The surface of the earth, clothed with verdure, is the inexhaustible source whence 
Man and Animals derive in common their subsistence. Every animated being lives 
mately upon vegetables, and vegetables are maintained by the debris or remains of every 
thing which has lived and vegetated. A perpetual round of existence is thus main- 
tained. Without D(?ath there could be no Life, and it is only by annihilating other 
beings that animals arc able to support themselves, and to continue their species; 
they must either feed on vegetables or upon other animals. Yet Nature, like an 
indulgent mother, has fixed limits to this apparently indiscriminate destruction. The 
carnivorous and voracious individuals are reduced to a small number, while she has 
largely multiplied both the species and individuals which are herbivorous. Man too 
has greatly assisted in exterminating, or confining within narrow limits, the predace- 
ous species, and in establishing the more peaceful tribes. Among tho Marine genera, 
although some are herbivorous, yet the greater number are nearly equally voracious. 
These devour their own and different species Avhhout ever appearing to exterminate 
each other, because their fecundity is as great as the destruction; and nearly all this 
mutual consumption acts as a new incentive to reproduction. 
Man stands foremost among the carnivorous tribes. Being the predominant species, 
he exercises over the other ^laminalia the privileges of a master. He has chosen 
those whicli please his taste, and forms them into humble dependants. By caus- 
ing them to multiply more rapidly than unassisted Nature would have done, they 
have given rise to numerous* flocks ; and from the care bestowed in their production, 
he acquires a natural right of immolating them to satisfy his wants. This power, 
however, extends much farther than his necessities would require; for, iudependeot 
of those species which he has subdued and can dispose according to his pleasure, he 
carries on a war of extermination against the wild Beasts, tho Birds, and the Fishes. 
He does not even confine himself to tho climate which he inhabits, but seeks for new 
delicacies in the remoter parts of the globe. Nature seems scarcely adequate to 
supply this continual demand for variety, and IMan alone may be said to consume more 
animal food than all the other IHammalia taken together. 
Next to Man, tho carnivorous beasts possess the most destructive habits, and aro 
at once the enemies of their fclloiv-aniraals, and the rivals of Man. Having the same 
appetites and the same fonduess for animal food, they are under the necessity of dis- 
puting with him the possession of their prey; and in the first ages of human society 
these formed one of the most formidable checks to civilization. Even at tho present 
time, in civilized Europe, it is by the utmost vigilance alone that ho can preserve his 
flocks and poultry from the ravages of the Wolf, tho Fox, the Ferret, and the 
Weasel. 
Sian thus carries on a continual war against the carnivorous animals, which he 
either pursues for pleasure or for safety. However superior to him in bodily strength 
or swiftness, the most powerful fall reaily victims to the union of numbers, the supe- 
rior powers of his mind, and especially to that peculiar art with w'hich ho avails him- 
self of the inert materials of Nature as instruments of destruction. No race of animals 
can resist the agency of gunpowder; the Whale falls before tho harpoon; tho Ele- 
phant aud Liuu cannot evade the pit-fall and the snare. The largest animals receive 
death or captivity at his hands, as certainly as tho smallest ; and Man can confine the 
limits. Or even exterminate every animal which comes within the sphere of his influ- 
ence. 
All animals, vrhether of tho same or of different species, arc naturally in a state of 
warfare. It is chiefly in the tribes more particularly styled carnivorous, that this war 
proceeds to open hostilities; yet thero is a silent and a secret opposition of interest, 
even among the most peaceful tribes. As their numbers continually increase, food 
becomes scarce, disease thins their numbers, and the remainder fall a ready prey to 
the stronger and fiercer animals. Like plants, they destroy each other as effectually 
by the mere occupancy of space as they could have done by the fiercest conflicts. 
The rising generation soon repairs the loss occasioned by the latter, but nothing can 
extend the numbers of a species beyond the limits marked by Natuie in the quantity 
of its food- 
This universal war of species is an established law of Nature, and, however start- 
ling it may appear at first sight, is advantageous on the whole. Violent deaths are as 
necessary to the proper regulation of Nature as natural deaths. The latter preserve 
the perpetual bloom of youth over tho face of the earth ; the former assist in main- 
taining the correct balance among the numbers of different species, and in restraining 
their exuberance within the proper limits. 
To illustrate this important law of Nature, let us consider for a moment some one 
of the inferior species, which serve for food to the higher classes. The Herrings 
offer themselves, at certain seasons, in myriads to our fishermen ; and, after nourishing 
the Birds which sport on the surface of the ocean, as well as the predaceous tribes 
frequenting its abysses, form the principal support of many nations of Europe during 
a considerable part of tho year. Tlie destruction which takes place among these 
Fishes is overwhelming; yet the consequences would be tremendous if their fecundity 
were not thus restrained. They would soon cover the surface of tho sea, their numbers 
would then destroy each other, for want of sufficient nourishment their fecundity would 
diminish, and famine and disease would produce the same results which other animals 
now effect. But their midevoured bodies would taint the atmosphere, perhaps the 
ocean itself, and the putrid miasmata arising therefrom would carry disease and death 
into all species of animated beings, as well as their own. Thus the false sensibility 
which seeks to restrain the mutual destruction of animals woold effectually ensure the 
entire annihilation of them all. As Nature is at present constituted. Life is the con- 
sequence of Death; were it otherwise disposed, one universal death-like stillness 
would pervade the face of Nature. As in tho animal frame, tho continued action of 
the vital power necessarily occasions death, so in the frame of Animated Nature the 
continuaneo of reproduction must bo followed by a corresponding destruction. Tho 
same observations which have been made upon the Herrings arc applicable to every other 
species, and hence we may fairly infer that there exists an absolute necessity for tho 
mutual destruction of animals. The futility of that philosophy of tho Brahmins which 
condemns tho use of animal food, is sufficiently obvious. From being founded in 
Nature it is a legitimate usage, and absolutely essential to tho well-being of tho 
whole. 
By taking a general view of tho constitution of Nature, we aro enabled to explain 
those apparent incongruities which strike the observer at first sight. We then dis- 
cover that “ these scattered evils are lost in the blaze of superabundant goodness, as 
the spots on the disk of the sun fade before the splendour of hU rays.” in every 
department of Nature we find 
“ All partial evil — universal good.” 
In these wars of the animals. Nature has provided that each creature should meet 
its death in the easiest possible manner. There is a certain spot in the spinal marrow 
where the two ascending main nerves that form the great brain cross one another, and 
if this spot be injured, death is the immediate consequence. This fact is well known 
to Huntsmen and Butchers. The latter plunges his knife into the ncuk of the Ox at 
that exact spot, tlio animal immediately drops, and ceases to live after a few convul- 
sions. On the same principle the Huntsman cuts through the neck of his game. 
The Carnivorous Animals always seize their prey by tho neck, and bite through 
this part. In tho same manner the Hound kills the Hare, and tho Bird of prey its 
quarry. The Pole-cat also destroys its prey at a single spring. Dr Gall locked up 
a Pole-cat for some time, during which he fed it on bones till its teeth were blunted. 
While in this state, it was unable to kill the Rabbits placed in its kennel with the 
same despatch as formerly; but when they had again grown sharp, Gall observed 
that, on the very first leap it made on the Rabbit, it cut the little animal’s neck on 
that very spot with a sharp fang, and instantaneous death ensued. Ho observed the 
same thing at .a hawking party of tho Emperor Joseph tho Second. As soon as tlie 
Hawk had reached the Haro, it would immediately cut tlirough that part of her neck 
with its bill. 
Yet Natm*e seems to have stamped a character of marked ferocity upon most Car- 
nivorous tribes. The Cat tonnents the captive Mouse, and scorns to take delight in 
its convulsive struggles to escape. The Tigress or female Leopard brings her prey 
Btill palpitating to her den, and gives tho first lessons of ferocity to her progeny. 
That sentiment of humanity towards our own species, imparted by Nature for the 
proper regulation of social intercourse, is transferred by us to the more intelligent and 
sensitive animals — in other worils, to those which most ncaidy resemble ourselves. 
We cut and cat a live Oyster without the slightest comniiseraiion, because it does 
not exhibit external signs of sensation, nm* docs it raise a cry of suffering when tho 
fatal moment arrives: yet few, whose feelings have not been bluuted by early habdj 
can bear to immolate a Lamb. A wise Providence has thus protected the higher 
animals from the gratuitous infliction of pain on the part of Man. However necessary 
the trade of Butcher or of Executioner may be to society, it always appears in som® 
degree odious. Tho Bralimins have carried this seiitiraent to a ridiculous extent* 
They permit tho most disgusting Insects to frequent their houses, their food, and tlici^ 
persons, without destroying them; and tho iMussalmans have erected hospitals for tkc 
accommodation of infirm Dogs. 
However odious the Carnivorous Animals may appear to us in the exercise of thcit 
legitimate calling, our sense of retributive justice is satisfied in knowing that most o 
them undergo the same fato whicli they have indicted on others. “ Every dog 
his day,” according to tho proverb. Tho proper counterpoise and equilibrium of 
mals could not be established without them, and their own final fate shows the genera^ 
system of reciprocity and that balance of good and evil prevailing throughout the Au>- 
mal Kingdom, 
The chief benevolent emotions which the Carnivorous tribes present aro seen in the 
