have been still more neglected than any other domestic animal in America. They are neither fed nor housed in the most rigorous season of the year. Yet they are larger than those measured by Mons. D'Aubenton, of 3 feet 7¼ inches, 3 feet 4 inches, and 3 feet 2½ inches; the latter weighing only 215.8 ℔.[1] These sizes, I suppose, have been produced by the same negligence in Europe, which has produced a like diminution here. Where care has been taken of them on that side of the water, they have been raised to a size bordering on that of the horse; not by the heat and dryness of the climate, but by good food and shelter. Goats have been also much neglected in America. Yet they are very prolific here, bearing twice or three times a year, and from one to five kids at a birth. Mons. de Buffon has been sensible of a difference in this circumstance in favor of America.[2] But what are their greatest weights I cannot say. A large sheep here weighs 100 ℔. I observe Mons. D'Aubenton calls a ram of 62 ℔ one of the middle size.[3] But to say what are the extremes of growth in these and the other domestic animals of America, would require information of which no one individual is possessed.[4] The weights actually known and stated in the third table preceding, will suffice to shew that we may conclude, on probable grounds, that, with equal food and care, the climate of America will preserve the races of domestic animals as large as the European stock from which they are derived; and consequently that the third member of Mons. de Buffon's assertion, that the domestic animals are subject to degeneration from the climate of America, is as probably wrong as the first and second were certainly so.
That the last part of it is erroneous, which affirms that the species of American quadrupeds are comparatively few, is evident from the tables taken all together. By these it appears that there are an hundred species aboriginal of America.[5] Mons. de Buffon supposes about double that number existing on the whole earth. Of these, Europe, Asia, and Africa, fur-
