Animalia

“ But all this time that we have been thinking about ants, and star-fish, and earthworms, we have been neglecting the creatures which we really care most about, and certainly know best, the cats and dogs and horses and rabbits and various pets of all sorts which we know by name, and which in return we believe are fond of us. These animals, the four-footed creatures with fur, and the birds, are of all living things most like ourselves. They are most like us in body, they are like us also in mind ”

“ Accordingly, zoologists have so arranged the animal kingdom that warm-blooded animals, including man, the birds, and the quadrupeds, are classified together; while the cold-blooded animals, such as the fish, tortoise, frog, and all that have no vertebral column, are classed by themselves. ”

“ Accordingly, we find that no structure exhibits such strange variations as the skin. Besides the regular modifications which we see in the scales or horny plates of fishes, the smooth coats or solid shells of reptiles, the feathers of birds, and the hair of mammals, numerous other minor peculiarities occur in almost every species. Such are the horns of cows and goats, the spike of the rhinoceros, the beaks, nails, claws, hoofs, and talons of beasts or birds, and the tail-plumes, ruffs, lappets, crests, and ornamental adjuncts of all the more aesthetic animals. ”

“ How far have we at present accounted for the varied animal colouration which we see around us? the glory of our cabinetdrawers, the mysterious wonder in the galleries of our museums, the charm of travellers abroad, and appreciative lovers of nature at home. Very much, when the difficulty of the problem is considered, and especially where the utility of animal disguises and mimicking appearances has been unravelled by the magic wand of "natural selection," or "the survival of the fittest." ”

“ It is different with the lower animals. They are there comparatively definite in their power and restricted in their application. The reader is familiar with what are called instincts in some of the humbler species, that is, an uniform and unprompted tendency towards certain particular acts, as the building of cells by the bee, the storing of provisions by that insect and several others, and the construction of nests for a coming progeny by birds. This quality is nothing more than a mode of operation peculiar to the faculties in a humble state of endowment, or early stage of development. ”

“ A few brief sentences, perspicuously worded and scientifically arranged, will enumerate all the characteristics of a lion, or a tiger, or a wolf, or a bear, or a squirrel, or a goat, or a horse, or an ass, or a rat, or a cat, or a hog, or a dog; and whatever is physiologically predicated of any individual lion, tiger, wolf, bear, squirrel, goat, horse, ass, hog, or dog, will be found to hold true of all lions, tigers, wolves, bears, squirrels, goats, horses, asses, hogs, and dogs whatsoever. ”

“ When considering such an aspect of the organism as the “choice” between the career of an odd-toed or even-toed ungulate, a cat or dog, a lion or tiger, a gibbon or other of the four anthropoid genera which assuredly was presented to certain groups of primitive ungulates carnivores, felidæ or apes, as historical beings, the vision of the process is sore let and hindered by the limiting force of certain expressions which have been sanctioned with the imprimatur of fifty years’ high thinking in the realms of high biology. ”

“ The next highest form among the mammals are known as the placentals, or those which bring forth mature young. In this class are found the ant-eaters, sloth, manatee, the whale and porpoise, the horse, cow, sheep, and other hoofed animals; the elephant, seal, the dog, wolf, lion, tiger, and all flesh eating animals; the hares, rats, mice, and ail other gnawing animals; the bats, moles, and other insect-feeders; then come the great family of apes, from the small monkeys up to the orang-outang, chimpanzee, and other forms nearly approaching man. ”

“ Bulls likewise were bred then with the heads of men, and dogs with fourfold bodies, terminated in their extremities with the tails of fishes; horses also with the heads of dogs; men, too, and other animals, with the heads and bodies of horses, and the tails of fishes. In short, there were creatures in which were combined the limbs of every species of animals. In addition to these, fishes, reptiles, serpents, with other monstrous animals, which assumed each other’s shape and countenance. ”

“ Let me call your attention to those vertebrate animals which are most familiar to you, such as mammals, birds, and reptiles. At the present day, these groups of animals are perfectly well-defined from one another. We know of no animal now living which, in any sense, is intermediate between the mammal and the bird, or between the bird and the reptile; but, on the contrary, there are many very distinct anatomical peculiarities, well-defined marks, by which the mammal is separated from the bird, and the bird from the reptile. ”

“ We need only recall the immense variations they offer within the mammal class. We have the slender legs of the deer and the strong springing legs of the kangaroo, the climbing feet of the sloth and the digging feet of the mole, the fins of the whale and the wings of the bat. ”

“ Where do we find, in nature, this multitude of races of dogs, which, as the result of domesticity to which we have reduced these animals, have been brought into their present condition? Where do we find these bull-dogs, greyhounds, water spaniels, spaniels, pug-dogs, etc., etc., races which present among themselves much greater differences than those which we admit to be specific in wild animals of the same genus? ”

“ We find, moreover, intermediate strains, such as swimming birds and suckling animals, which live in the water, amphibious species and others which still further mediate between the more obviously generic. These are, however, mere confusions of race, and indicate no higher mediation of considerable range. Throughout we find the animal subject in its self-preservation to the absolute necessities of external nature, cold, drought, or insufficient supply of the means of nourishment. ”

“ There the dogs would soon devour him,
Birds of prey would feast upon him;
Have not hidden him in Swamp-land,
Have not buried him in heather;
There the worms would live upon him,
Insects feed upon his body. ”

“ Naturally to such an active mind as his, the study and observation of one animal could not help but be an introduction to the other forms of animal life. The deer, wolves, minks, lynx, wild cats, skunks, otter, coons, porcupines, woodchucks, squirrels, chipmunks, frogs, fish, nutes, salamanders, snakes, birds and a host of others he had never dreamed of crowded upon his attention and filled the woods with a new interest. ”

“ Even our pets, such as cage-birds, pigeons, poultry, dogs, cats, rabbits, mice, rats, etc., produce young which break into new colours and new properties. The uniformity of Nature is disturbed and variation is the result, and that in almost every conceivable direction. ”

“ The colours of many animals seem adapted to their purposes of concealing themselves either to avoid danger, or to spring upon their prey. Thus the snake and wild cat, and leopard, are so coloured as to resemble dark leaves and their lighter interstices; birds resemble the colour of the brown ground, or the green hedges, which they frequent; and moths and butterflies are coloured like the flowers which they rob of their honey. ”

“ Their care is to catch the varying, elusive personalities which dwell back of the luminous brain windows of the dog, the horse, the deer, or wrap themselves in reserve behind the inscrutable eyes of all the cats, or sit aloof in the gaze of the hawk and the eagle. The animal story at its highest point of development is a psychological romance constructed on a framework of natural science. ”

“ But among all the larger creatures of the animal kingdom, it is difficult to find more than a dozen species which are, as a class, ill-tempered, unless we include all those carnivorous animals which exhibit a certain ferocity in the capture of their prey. ”

“ Now if, as still happens every year, there be discovered in any part of the earth a new species of mammal, a new species of marsupial, or a new species of deer, or a new species of ape, every zoologist knows with certainty at once, without having examined its inner structure, that this species must possess a quadruple heart, a brain and spinal marrow, like all other mammals. ”

“ The differences which separate the mammals, birds, reptiles, and fishes from each other, though vast, yet seem of the same nature as those which distinguish a mouse from an elephant or a swallow from a goose. ”

“ We know, that in these forests, perhaps near enough to see us, though their forms are hidden by their likeness to their leafy surroundings and the dappled sunlight, are animals as various as elephants, tigers, leopards, foxes, squirrels, and bats; birds as various as hawks, parrots, and finches; and insects from butterflies, bees, and wasps to crickets, beetles, and ants. The forest, we know, in addition to all the wealth of tree and plant life, is teeming with animal and insect life, though of this we are able to see very little, so carefully do animals conceal themselves. ”

“ The species possessing this marvellous vitality flourish even under the most adverse circumstances, in spite of the attacks of countless enemies, even when man himself is added to the list of destroyers—such species as the White Cabbage Butterflies amongst insects, the Herring amongst fishes, the House-Sparrow amongst birds, and Rats and Rabbits amongst the Mammalia. ”

“ For if everything that moves and lives was made for food, and prepared for the stomach, let my opponents tell me why elephants, lions, leopards, and wolves were created; why vipers, scorpions, bugs, lice, and fleas; why the vulture, the eagle, the crow, the hawk; why whales, dolphins, seals, and small snails were created. Which of us ever eats the flesh of a lion, a viper, a vulture, a stork, a kite, or the worms that crawl upon our shores? As then these have their proper uses, so may we say that other beasts, fishes, birds, were created not for eating, but for medicine. ”

“ Let us also place there the animal life natural to the willow and its plants—the flies, beetles, and other insects, with the winged creatures who do battle with them, such as the aquatic dragon-flies, gleaming like burnished steel, who catch them in the air, the water-wagtails who, with their tails cocked, pursue them to earth, and the kingfishers who lie in wait for them at the water's edge. ”

“ You, the animal, do but exist through the absorption of these vegetable substances, and why should you not obey the analogical law of absorption and aggregation? You killed a deer to-day;—the flesh you will appropriate to supply the wants of your own material organization; but the life, the spirit which made that flesh a deer, in obedience to which that shell of external appearance is moulded,—you missed that. ”

“ We have now arrived at the highest rank in the scale of animal life—the four-footed, hair-clad, milk-nursed denizens of our woods and fields—the subclass Mammalia, mammals.
These are the "animals" of popular speech, but accuracy requires a more distinctive expression, for every living thing not a plant is an "animal." ”

“ It who maketh that fishes live in the rivers and the winged fowl in the air; who giveth the breath of life to (the germ) in the egg. It maketh to live birds of all species, and likewise the insects which creep and also those which fly. ”

“ But under this general principle in the structure of carnivorous animals, the ingenious anatomist further discovered that there are several particular modifications, depending upon the size, the manners, and the haunts of prey for which each species is destined or fitted by nature ”

“ But what a vast variety is there of animals! and how wonderfully is every kind adapted to preserve itself! Some are covered with hides, some clothed with fleeces, and some guarded with bristles; some are sheltered with feathers, some with scales; some are armed with horns, and some are furnished with wings to escape from danger. ”

“ The groups have, therefore, been subdivided into five classes, which we will study in succession, only naming each now: viz. mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, and batrachians. Do not alarm yourself at this last name: it is a Greek word, meaning simply frogs.
The mammals are our immediate neighbors. Mammalia are the animals which produce milk. They bring forth their young alive, and give suck to them as soon as they are born. ”

“ Waking from my dozing at the hour when judgment sits upon the hearts of men, I sat in ponderous judgment upon all to whom the bungling of the previous day was due. There were the rats and mice, and cats and owls, and creaks and cracks—no quiet about the place from night to morning. Then came the barking of dogs, the noises of the cocks and kine, of horses and foals, of pigs and geese—the general wail of the zoological kingdom—cows bellowing, duck diplomacy, and much else. ”

“ In spite of the rapid progress which the science of zoology has made during the last twenty years, the study of living mammals in captivity remains a comparatively neglected branch of natural history, being almost entirely left to the learned members of zoological societies. The private individuals who have systematically taken up this most interesting work may almost be enumerated on the fingers of one hand—this neglect of so fascinating a pursuit being all the more remarkable considering the activity displayed by naturalists in other departments of the animal world. ”