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them have a black stripe on the back, and both, likewise, have a tail nearly of the same size. The number of exterior resemblances is so great, in comparison with the differences, and the conformity of the exterior parts is so complete, that if we reason in consequence of these accounts, we might be led to believe, that these two animals are not really of a different species, but that they are simply only constant varieties of one and the same species. The ibex, as well as the chamois, when taken young and brought up with domestic goats, is easily tamed; and, accustomed to domesticity, imbibe the same manners, and herd together. The animal is five feet in length, and inhabits the Alps, Pyrenees, and other mountains in Europe.

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ALTHOUGH the goat is a distinct species, and perhaps more distant from that of the sheep than the species of the ass is from that of the horse, yet goats will willingly couple with sheep, as the ass with the mare, and are sometimes prolific; but they have never introduced any intermediate species between the goat and the sheep. These two species are distinct, remaining constantly separated, and always at the same distance from each other, and have never been changed by this mixture, or produced any new stock, or new breed of intermediate animals; for they have, at most, only produced different individuals, which has no influence on the unity of each primitive species, and which, on the contrary, confirms the reality of their different characteristics.

The goat has naturally more understanding, and can shift better for herself than the sheep; she comes voluntarily, and is easily familiarized; she is sensible of caresses, and capable of attachment; she is also stronger, lighter, more agile, and less timid than the sheep; she is lively, capricious, and lascivious.

Goats are fond of straying in solitary places, are fond of climbing up steep places, sleeping on the tops of rocks, and on the brink of precipices. They leap with ease and security among the most dreadful precipices; and 1 Capra hircus, LIN.

even when two of them are linked together, they will leap in such perfect concert as to reach in safety the desired spot.

The inconstancy of this animal's nature is shown by the irregularity of her actions. She walks, stops short, runs, jumps, advances, retreats, shows, then hides herself, or flies; and this all from caprice, or without any other determinate cause than her whimsical vivacity. And all the suppleness of the organs, all the nerves of the body, are scarcely sufficient for the petulance and rapidity of these motions, which are all natural to her.

That these animals are naturally fond of mankind, and that in uninhabit ed places they do not become wild, the following anecdote serves to confirm. "In 1698, an English vessel having put into harbor at the island of Bonavista, two negroes presented themselves on board, and offered the English as many goats as they chose to carry away. On the captain manifesting a degree of surprise at this offer, the negroes observed there were but twelve persons in all the island; that the goats multiplied so fast, that they became troublesome; and that, far from having any difficulty in taking them, they followed them with a kind of obstinacy, like domestic animals.

Goats go five months with young, and bring forth at the beginning of the sixth month; they suckle the young ones for about a month or five weeks; so that it may be reckoned about six-and-twenty weeks from the time of their coupling till the time that the young kid begins to eat. The goat generally produces one kid, sometimes two, very rarely three, and never more than four; and she brings forth young, from a year or eighteen months, to seven years. The knobs in the horns, and their teeth, ascertain their age. The number of teeth is not always the same in female goats; but they have usually fewer than the male goat, which has also the hair rougher, and the beard and the horns longer. These animals, like oxen and sheep, have four stomachs, and chew the cud. This species is more diffused than the sheep; and goats, like the European, are found in several parts of the world; only in Guinea and other warm countries they are smaller, but in Muscovy and other cold climates they are larger.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN GOAT.1

THIS animal inhabits the most lofty peaks of the Rocky Mountains, seldom descending so near the low country as the Rocky Mountain sheep. Their manners are said to resemble greatly those of the domestic goat. The exact limits of the range of this animal have not been ascertained, but it probably extends from the fortieth to the sixty-fourth, or sixty-fifth

1 Capra montana, OBD.

degree of latitude. It is common on the elevated part of the range that gives origin to the Mackenzie, Columbia, Nelson, and Missouri rivers. The fine wool which the animal produces, grows principally on the back and hips, and is intermixed with long coarse hair. From the circumstance of its bearing wool, it has occasionally been termed a sheep by the voyagers,

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and even by naturalists. Some little confusion has, therefore, crept into the accounts of its habits, which have been published from the reports of traders. Its flesh is hard and dry, and is little esteemed. The Indians make caps and saddles of its skin. The Hudson's Bay company have very lately presented a perfect specimen of the goat to the Zoological Society. This animal is of the size of the domestic sheep, and is totally white, except the horns, hoofs, lips, and margins of the nostrils. The horns are black and shining.

THE ANGORA GOAT

Is found in Natolia in Asia Minor. It is distinguished from the European goat, by the greater size of its ears, though it is only a variety of the same species; they mix and produce together, even in our climate. The males have horns almost as long as the common goat, but the circumference and directions are very different, and they are of a dazzling white color; they are extended horizontally on each side of the head, and form spirals, some

what like a worm. The horns of the female are short, and first turn round backwards, then bend down, and turn round before, so much, that they end near the eyes; and in some their circumference and direction vary. The male and female goat of Angora, which we have seen, are such as we have

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described. These goats, like all the animals of Syria, have the hair very long and thick, and so fine that stuffs have been made of it, almost as handsome and glossy as our silks. It is, in fact, what is commonly termed mohair. The stuffs made from the hair of this goat are known by the name of camlet.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN SHEEPI

INHABIT the lofty chain of mountains from whence they derive their name; from its northern termination in latitude sixty-eight, to about latitude forty degrees, and most likely still further south. They also frequent the elevated and craggy ridges with which the country between the great mountain range and the Pacific is intersected; but they do not appear to have advanced further to the eastward than to the declivity of the Rocky Mountains, nor are they found in any of the hilly tracts nearer to Hudson's Bay. They collect in flocks, consisting of from three to thirty, the young rams and females herding together during the winter and spring, while the old rams form separate flocks. The ewes bring forth in June or July, and then retire with

1 Ovis montana, GEOFF. The genus Ovis has eight lower incisors; no canines; twelve upper and twelve lower molars. Horns common to both sexes; sometimes wanting in the female, thick, angular, wrinkled transversely, pale colored, turned laterally in a spiral form; ears small; legs slender; hair of two kinds; tail more or less short; two

mammæ.

their lambs to the most inaccessible heights. Mr Drummond informs us, that in the retired parts of the mountains, where the hunters had seldom penetrated, he found no difficulty in approaching the Rocky Mountain sheep, which there exhibited the simplicity of character so remarkable in the domestic species; but that where they had been often fired at, they were exceedingly wild, alarmed their companions on the approach of danger by a hissing noise, and scaled the rocks with a speed and agility that baffled pursuit. He lost several that he had mortally wounded, by their retiring to die amongst the secluded precipices.

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Their favorite feeding places, are grassy knolls, skirted by craggy rocks, to which they can retreat, when pursued by dogs or wolves. They are accustomed to pay daily visits to certain caves in the mountains, that are encrusted with a saline efflorescence, of which they are fond. These caves are situated in slaty rocks. Mr Drummond says, that the horns of the old rams attain a size so enormous, and curve so much forwards and downwards, that they effectually prevent the animal from feeding on level ground. Its flesh is said by those who have fed on it, to be quite delicious when it is in season, far superior to that of any of the deer species which frequent the same quarter, and even exceeding in flavor the finest English

mutton.

The missionaries who first discovered the Rocky Mountain sheep, describe it correctly as possessing the hair and the horns of the ram; and M. Geoffroy has also briefly characterized it as having the head of sheep, with the body

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