make way. When on a journey, the rider himself carries in his hand a little ftick pointed with iron, with which he pricks his beaft on the withers. When the rider alights, he has no occafion to tie up his afs. He merely pulls the rein of the bridle tight, and paffes it over a ring on the fore part of the faddle, which, confining the head of the beaft, is fufficient to make him remain patiently in his place. Though the Arabs do not take quite fo much pains to preserve the breed of their affes, as they do for promoting the excellence of their horfes, it may be faid with truth, that affes are no where attended with fo much care as in Egypt and Arabia. They are regularly rubbed down and washed: which renders their coat fmooth, foft, and gloffy: and their food is the fame as that of horfes, commonly confifting of chopped. ftraw, barley, and small beans. To add to the fpecies of ufeful animals, or, which is the fame thing, to improve them fo as to render them more useful, is to increase the advantages of public and private economy. If, without remitting our attentions to the horse, we deigned to pay a little regard to the afs, though placed by nature fecond in the scale, we could not fail to be gainers. For the attainment of this useful object, it would be necessary to cross the breed. Arabian or Egyptian males would improve the offspring of our females in ftrength and beauty; and these, by repeated croffings, would produce with time and care an excellent breed of animals, fuited to the majority in point of expenfe, and not deftitute of pleafing qualities. The handsomeft affes feen at Cairo come from Upper Egypt and Nubia. On afcending the Nile, the influence of climate on these animals is perceptible, they being of the greatest beauty in Saïd, while toward the Delta they are inferior in all refpects. So true it is, that they owe their excellencies to great heat and extreme drought. In countries, which, though very hot, are at the fame time wet, they are but indifferent: for in India, and even the fouthernmost parts of the peninfula, which are nearer to the equator, but likewife 'more humid, than Arabia, Nubia, and Thebaïs, the affes are fmall, dull, weak, and ill-shaped **. From the excellent qualities of the Egyptian affes, it is not to be wondered that they have been objects of luxury. The opulent vied in keeping affes of the highest price. To the Europeans fettled at Cairo, this was an indemnification for the restraint from riding on horfeback, to which they were condemned. But this fpecies of luxury attracted the attention of government in 1779. It was deemed indecorous, that foreign merchants, abominated on account of their religion, fhould ride upon animals fuperior even to those kept for the wives of the beys themfelves. This was fufficient to bring upon the European merchants a forced contribution, an avanie of four or five hundred thoufand franks, which they were obliged to pay, for having kept fine affes. In the caft, these were at all times among the number of animals moft valued. They formed part of the wealth of the ancient patriarchs, as they ftill do of the herds of the wandering nations in the fame countries. The Egyptians alone abominated them. To them they were the execrated emblem of the evil genius of Typhon, of that giant monster with a hundred heads, and a hundred mouths vomiting flame, the son of Earth and Tartarus, who had dared to wage war with the gods, and had at laft been cut to pieces by Ofiris, one of the deities of Egypt. The inhabitants of Coptos in particular, fo publicly declared their inveterate anti *Such at least is the affertion of the author of Effais Philofophiques fur les Mours de divers Animaux étrangers, pages 240 et 246.-Pliny had obferved, that the afs was not fond of cold countries, ipfum animal frigoris maxime impatiens. Hist. Nat. lib. viii. cap. 43. pathy pathy to these animals, as to throw them down from the fummit of a rock; and the people of Bufiris and Ly. copolis carried their fuperftition fo far as to refrain from blowing the trumpet, because, in their opinion, its found refembled the braying of an ass * ! CURIOUS PARTICULARS CHARACTERISTIC OF EACH MONTH IN THE YEAR, Chiefly extracted from the New Edition of Dr. Aikin's Caler dar of Nature. 1. CALENDAR OF NATURE. DECEMBER. Oh winter! ruler of th' inverted year, THE COWPER'S TASK. HIS month, in general, the most unpleasant in the whole year. 2. Vapours, clouds and ftorms, form almoft the only viciffitudes of weather; thus, according to Shakespeare-" The rain and wind * See the Differtation fur Typhon, par l'Abbé Banier, member of the Academy of Infcriptions and Belles Lettres, tome iii. page 116. Hh 3 beat beat dark December." 3. Every change now melancholy, advancing to univerfal gloom and defolation: No mark of vegetable life is feen, No bird to bird repeats his tuneful call, Save the lone red-breast on the mofs-grown wall. SCOTT. 4. Wild quadrupeds and amphibious animals retire to their winter quarters, which they feldon quit till the return of fpring. 5. Some lay up no ftores of provifions, and therefore become entirely torpid, till the warm weather reftores them, and their food along with them; thus the frog, lizard, badger, hedge-hog, and bat, all of whom feed on infects or vegetables. 6. Dormice lie torpid the greater part of the winter, though laying up fome food, they, on a warm day, revive, eat it, and then relapfe into their former condition. 7. Squirrels, water-rats, and field-mice, provide large ftores of provifion; not known to be torpid, but, probably, fleep more at this time than in fummer. 8. Cold is the immediate caufe of torpidity in animals. 9. A frog immersed in water at thirty-two degrees, or the freezing point, becomes torpid in a few moments, and the application of a warmth of 50 degrees, will restore it to activity. 10. The only vegetables now flourishing, are moffes and lichens, or liver- worts; thus offering their fructification to the botanift, when the rest of nature is dead to him. 11. Moffes of little ufe in commerce, domeftic economy, or as food for either man or beaft. 12. Lichens, fome ufeful; viz. one fort, confifting of white flexible branches, the fole fubfiftence of the deer in Lapland; and alfo the Iceland lichen, ufed when fresh, medicinally, as a purgative, but when dried, a fubftitute for bread to the inhabitants of the arctic regions. 13. Many kinds ufed as dying drugs, efpecially a grey one, found in the Canary Islands, efteemed for its purple dye, fugitive, but extremely beau tiful, and used for giving a luftre to filks. 14. Lichens Barren as lances, among which the wind And more afpiring, and with ampler spread, Shall boaft new charms, and more than they have loft. |