MUDIE'S DOMESTICATED ANIMALS.

FM writers have more contributed to the present and the growing taste for natural hii,tory than Mr. Menu:. Uniting in himself no mean technical knowledge, with very extensive observation of na- ture, lie Wits able to present the reader with graphic descriptions and interesting accounts of dumb creatures, without neglecting or mistaking their scientific characteristics. Many who would be wearied by a minute anatomical description, or a formal arrange- ment of genera and species, will cheerfully peruse a sort of bio- graphy of birds, anti be led to give some attention to the structure of parts, when they had learned their uses, and the wonderful adaptation of means to ends displayed in the smallest production of nature. Our author's success, however, would have beets much greater in every way, had he confined himself strictly to the busi- ness in hand, instead of branching out into matters which have no connexion with his subjects. Ile is like a man undertaking a journey, and wandering from his road after every object which strikes his fancy. It is very true that lie may meet with a variety of pleasant things to attract his attention in these deviations, but it delays the journey he has undertaken to perform, and tires the expectation of those with whom he has contracted, Domesticated Animals, though not free from Mr. Munies beset- ting fault, is one of the best volumes lie has published; being novel in its views, and treated both ably and in an attractive manner. The main object is to indicate the effect which certain classes of animals have had upon the civilization of mankind, by means of their geographical distribution and their peculiar nature, and from this survey to deduce laws for our future benefit —not merely in improving the breed of animals, but also in the management of the earth, on which and by which both they and we live. Inseparably connected with this object, though subordinate to it, is a natural history of the creatures themselves.

The work, it will be seen, is disquisitional, descriptive, and his- torical; the disquisition embracing a conjectural predication of the state of man from the animals by which he was surrounded; the history, a sketch of' the progress of society and the state of the world at various periods; the description, an account of the differ- ent animals; of the countries in which they are found, and of' the localities most favourable to their wellbeing. According to Mr. MCDIE, the native of Australia was doomed to barbarism by nature : he had no animals to prepare or improve the laud for agriculture, to assist him in its cultivation, or even, like the hog, to serve for food when domesticated. The kangaroo, the largest and most important, was useless for the former purposes, and incapable of domestication. The inhabitants ot' America, and of the sandy districts in the Old World, were enabled by their beasts to attain a certain degree of civilization ; but the camel or the llama are only of a limited utility, and incapable, like the localities they are adapted to, of being applied to many pur- poses': the owner of such beasts must be a Bedouin Arab or a Peruvian. The goat seems rather an advance upon the eamellidm. Though useless (hr purposes of labour, mid perhaps for improving the soil, it is a valuable animal for its milk, its hair, and its flesh. Being also capable of' domestication, it brings mankind into the condition of herdsmen ; and although neglected as society ad- vances, it is still tended with the care bestowed on property in Italy and other places, (where, let us add, the soil will not sup- port another animal with equal profit.) The sheep is a great advance upon the goat, not only for its numbers, tlesb, and wool, but for its greater adaptability to climate and pasturage, and the manner in which it improves the soil. The owner of a large flock 'of sheep, too, we tnust all admit to be a more respectable man than a goatherd or a Bedouin Arab ; though as thr as bullion is con-

cerned, an Inca of Peru would have exCelled either. The ox is as ,valuable as the sheep in certain ways. -It is equally capable of

adapting itself to climate.; it can equally vary its pasturage and improve the soil. But the capability of the ox for labour, either

of draught or burden, enables his possessor to attain a higher -dos, gree of civilization; that is, when the nature of the country is fitt liar cultivation, and perhaps induces the inhabitant to dultiVate the New Zealander, for example, being a sort of agriculturist withm4 . labouring animals, whilst the Tartar has labouring animals in plenty

without greatly advancing civilization. The flesh, skin, and milk, of the horse, are not equal to those of sheep or oxen, but his capacity for labour is greater ; and the true development of his powers is,' Mr. MuntE conceives, the last stage of civilization—the horse being' used in earlier ages for battle, hunting, or parade, but not for useful purposes. The ass is only a subordinate sort of horse. These animals, however, are by no means all that Mr. MunrE treats of. The hog is capable of domestication, and a profitable animal, though useless for labour, and not contributing much to civi- lization ; unless we hold that the act of domesticating implies, and tends to further form, a civilized mind. A few species of deer ad- mit of less domestication than the hog, and are no profit at all but they and all other deer, with the antelopes, are treated of, from their relation to goats and sheep ; as arc zebras, hippopotami, Sx. from their reference to the horse.

The countries all these animals frequent, the soil they naturally. delight in, and the changes they will bear without perishing, are also described.Asa general rule it may be laid down, that ank ma's of the goat tribe, with some antelopes, are the denizens Of the mountain-top ; and gradually give place to the sheep as the mountains melt into hill and upland. The dry plain is the natural. residence of the horse ; the ass, the zebras, the gnus, &c. down to: the antelopes, tending more and more towards the sandy desert,• where only creatures of immense speed and endurance, capable of readily transporting themselves to great distances, could procure u' sufficiency of food. Rich grassy plains, pretty well watered, form the most fitvourable pasturage of the buffalo or ox tribe, who also' resort to the forest and the marsh for shelter. Ramifying from the fresh and grassy plain in two directions, arc found the haunts of various other animals. The deer frequents the depths of the green wood; the rhinoceros and hippopotamus the alluvial marshes of tro- pical rivers ; whilst the elephant and the hoe'° are at home in either place, though preferring the forest. From all which it may be in- ferred that animals capable of domestication have naturally th0 best taste, according to human standards. They avoid extremes, selecting places winch are most favourable to man ; and though, like him, they can endure the forest, the marsh, or the mountain- top, yet they do not seek such places as a residence, but merely as a change.

Mr. Munta's subjects are not yet exhausted. On the contrary, the effects which animals produce upon soils and vegetation, as well as the cotiperating results of vegetation itself Upon the land', form one of the most curious and useful parts of the book: A. reprint of the Seventh Chapter, with selections from other portions of the volume, would form a very agreeable tract for nevi settlers in every region. Here are some remarks the Australians may find of use ; though we must observe that the opening assertion, " no savannahs were found in Australia, because there were no beeves or buffidoes to graze upon them," is not logical; for we may reverse it with equal probability, and say—no beeves were found in Aus- tralia, because there were no savannahs.

THE CRAZING BITE—IIINTS AND HOPES TOR AUSTRALASIA.

No savannahs were found in Australia, because there were no beeves or buffaloes to graze upon them ' • and the grasses upon the uplands were in Irby tufts, few and. thr between, because there were no sheep to pasture there. The kaugfiria was the only grazing animal; and it is not adapted to flue grasses, either in the structure of its teeth or in those of its organ of locomotion. The proper grazing mouth is that which has eight chisel-shaped cutting teeth in the under jaw, acting against a cartilaginous surface of the upper. These cut the herbage clean, without that pulling up by the roots which is apt to Lep:rimmed by a month of any other structure. The mouth of the great kangurit also coma:us eight cutting teeth ; but they are very diarently dis- persed; for there are only two of them in the under jaw, and there are six ius the upper. A mouth o? this kind makes a ragged bite, and cankers the re- mainder of the vegetable upon width it feeds t so that a dock of kangiarits would very soon destroy the grass of a park or meadow. * * The mouths of those paehydertuatous animals which are domesticated, are also biting months, not graziug ones; and tIlerefore their bronsing does not improve the pasture to the same extent as th.Lt of the us and the sheep. The cutting teeth of the horse and the ass are six in each jaw, and the males have always canine teeth, or tusks; and the hog genus have always six cutting teeth in the under jaw mid four or six in the upper. They have also canines, or tusks, which are very long and formidable in the wale Eddie wild hog; bat they are not true teeth. • We need not say that the feeding of hogs does not in any way conduce to the improvement of the pastures upon which they are turned; for, if they are not ringed to prevent them from rooting, they plough up the surface ad devour the roots of the plants. Even the horse, whidi comes perhaps the nearest to a grazino' animal of all the order to which it belongs, cannot be said to be an improver of the surfiice. Its bite is ragged, mid it is apt to tear up the herbage in tufts; and unless it can get •• a long bite," it cannot subsist.

The characteristic grazing months are therefore those of the ox and the sheep, of which that of the sheep is decidedly the neatest; and, when either the one or the other of these is turned upon the proper pastures, not in too great numbers, they always improve the quality ot that pasture. Sheep, in- deed, bite ii close that they cannot be, with impunity, turned upon some of the more valuable artificial grasses • for those grasses have CrOwild Or coronal plates at or the surthce of the ground. from which alone vegetation can be :wide : and if those are nibbled off, or even jagged and torn by the sheep, the plants grow no more. Oxen do not bite either so dean or so close as sheep ; and therefore they re- quire more. rank herbage ; but they can be allowed to pasture upon fields of those plants the crowns and the vegetation a which would be destroyed by sheep.

The aversion of Americans for trees, and the rapid exhaustion of the soil in the New World, are well known. The exhaustion has been attributed to careless- and exacting husbandry. Hear • Mr. MCDIE on

THE USE OF ANIMALS.

In many parts of the British Colonies, Canada especially, the people have actually lost their land from want of domesticated animals. The soft land from which the timber lies just been cleared yields one crop or two by simply turning or scratching the surffice, but it is too tender for bearing the full action of the sun and the atmosphere, from which it has been previously COD- uettled for ages; and the soil of which it consists being in great part composed of leaf mould and other very light matters, very speedily loses its fertility, and becomes a wilderness of annual weeds, in which not even the coarseq of the pasture grasses can find substance to germinate. Whereas if, by any means, the very same surface could be left with a partial shade of trees over it, and made a pasture of sheep or cattle, according as might be most suitable, it would acquire firmness to maintain its place and fertility sufficient to repay the labour of cul- tivation, with an ample increase. Let us see what our author says on another use of trees and hedges; we take it from a very valuable disquisition on the subject. USE OF PLANTATIONS on HEDGE-ROWS.

" If the cultivator come and seats himself upon the margin of the forest, he

may, by skilful management, extend his doodahs!) both ways ; but if he shall destroy the natural balance, by attacking the fbrest and clearing it en masse, and before his skill and the assistance of his browsing animals have brought a firm grassy sod upon a considerable portion of th,s naked surffice, the winter is sure to invade him, and paralyze, if not destroy, his cultivation. " The arid plain, or semi-desert, for that is the real character of all plains, which are neither ploughed nor pastured, and which are naked or timber, always has an army ready for these invasions; and the innumerable squadron of this army ride on every wind and defy every opposition which man can make to them. They consist of the winged seeds of the CoreposFtue one of the most numerous and productive fiindlies of plants, and the family which, in the natu- ral order, ranks nearest to the heaths and other flowering plants of the abso- lute desert. These arc the thistles, the marigolds, the magworts, the grouts- sels, and an endless list of others, the seeds of which are, in one or another of the species, always on the wing, and ready to take possession of every unoc- cupied spot of ground. Upon imor soils its the neighbourhood of the moors, on or other of these plants, and not unfrequently a host of them together, divide the value of the sowed fields with the farmer, and Mke fullpess.s.sion of the naked patches and the billows. To root them out or turn them down by the plough, is at best hut a temporary relief; fur the wind carries the s,cds over very long distances; and as some. of them are in seed during nearly the whole season of vegetation, the weeds, as they are called, make their appearance in every field the surface of which has been left bare of vegetation for even a few weeks. The most remarkable inva,ien by these plants is Brat by the Ca- nadian thistle, which has taken complete possession of the rich lands along the north shore of Lake Ontario, and has actually driven the settlers and their cul- tivation a good ninny miles inland. No such invasion as this has taken place in Britain ; hut there once were many and there are still a few, indeed we fear not a few, places in the British Islands, where one or other of these plants lords it over the corn and gives to the field its prevailing character; and Ha garden is neglected for but a year or two, its flowering and ornamentel plants will be found extinct, or nearly so, and their places occupied by these invaders. " The grand, and indeed the only deb:lice which man can have against the attack of these formidable enemies upon a newly-cleared or a badly-cultivated district, is to call in the aid of the forest, and plant them out. A dead hedge, if tall and, close enough, will be of use for a time, until the belt of planting shall have risen to II greater height than that to which those winged seeds are carried. Generally speaking, this height is not yery great, for the motion of the seeds is usually a combination of rolling and flying. But they can get over a much greater height of solid wall than of hedge or plantation of any kind. The wind, when it beats against a wall, is turned upward, in the full force of its current and elasticity jointly; and therefore it carries seeds and other light substances along with it ; whereas the hedge or planting stifles the elasticity, admits the wind partially, and filters it from those light and winged substances, thereby affording a far more efficient defence against the invasion by the desert." Upon Mr. 31T.TDIE'S more native topic, natural history, we must give one extract—

THE LEAP OP THE ANTELOPE.

The small footing of rock upon which the little elastic animal can stand is perfectly astonishing; such as we would hardly suppose to afford sufficient clutch for the gripe of an eagle, all powerfully as that most majestic of birds anchors itself upon the pinnacle, and braves the utmost fury of the tempest. There is no clutching power in the hoofed feet of the mountain antelope, but the walls of their hoofs are sharp, and ahnost as hard as flint ; their tendons are as cords of steel ; and their muscles are almost disembodied motion—such is their energy in proportiou to their size. The four feet are brought close to- gether on the point of the rock, as if they formed a disc like that on the under part of those fishes which adhere to the rocks by a pectoral sucker, and find their food in security, despite the turmoil of the rapidly-racing waters. So does the mountain antelope poise itself on the pinnacle of the crag, with an instinctive management of the centre of gravity ; but yet a management so perfect that the most prolonged and elaborate study of mats cannot come up to at. When the animal wishes to spring, which it can do for many feet and alight with perfect safety upon another craggy point, it bends the joints of' its legs pretty equally-; but as the projecting angle of the hind-ones is backwards, and that of the fore-ones forwards, the betiding prepares them for very different portions of the leap which the animal is to take. The extension of the fore- legs, .ny bringing back the joints which answer to the wrists its man, tends to throw the hotly upwards, and the instant that this has freed the anterior hoofs of the rock, the whole animal, in its hind-legs and its back, acts like a bonded bow, and discharges itself from the tips of the hind hoofs with such velocity, that if it were to impinge upon a lion it would fell him to the grnund. Instinct bails it to suit the exertion to the distance it has to go, of which the same in- stinct enables it to take measure by the eye ; and by this means, when it ar- rives at the point on which it intends to alight, the momentum of the leap is exhausted, and it alights in safety and is again instantly balanced. Among the motions of animals, varied and curious as they are, there are not many equal to this, whether in energy, in rapidity, or in certainty. lit fact, the whole mechani- cal process is performed as quick almost as thought ; and although one is its the most favourable situation for viewing it, all that can be seen is the transfer of the bounding animal from crag to crag.

The reader should be warned that there are many. other things in Domesticated Animals besides what we have mentioned ; most of which would have been better away. The opening chapters con- tain long-winded discussions de omnibus,—how God made the country and man the town ; how many professed naturalists do not know how to observe nature, and how SITAR SPREE did ; what are the intellectual defects of the present day, and the probable cause ; with many other matters equally impertinent to the proper business of the book. And when these are got rid of, and the author fairly in his theme, he is too apt to be led astray by any attractive thing which appears before him : thus horses lead to stage-coaches, stage-coaches to locomotive travelling and railroads, railroads to the death of' WILmAat HUSKISSON, and WILLIAM HUSKISSON to the arts of stockjobbers.