1331. A comparison between the quadrupeds of the Old and New Worlds is in every point strikingly in favour of the former. Not only has the western continent no animals of such giant bulk as those of the eastern, but no examples of such high organisation, such power and courage, as the African lion and the Asiatic tiger display. Buffon's remark must indeed be considerably modified, respecting the cowardice of the American feline race; for the jaguar of the woods about the Amazon, when attacked by man, will not hesitate to accept his challenge, will even become the assailant, nor shrink from an encounter against the greatest odds. The following passages from the writings of Humboldt show that this transatlantic animal is not to be despised:—
"The night was gloomy; the Devil's Wall and its denticulated rocks appeared from time to time at a distance, illuminated by the burning of the savannahs, or wrapped in ruddy smoke. At the spot where the bushes were the thickest, our horses were frightened by the yell of an animal that seemed to follow us closely. It was a large jaguar, that had roamed for three years among these mountains. He had constantly escaped the pursuit of the boldest hunters, and had carried off horses and mules from the midst of enclosures; but, having no want of food, had not yet attacked men. The negro who conducted us uttered wild cries. He thought he should frighten the jaguar; but these means were of course without effect. The jaguar, like the wolf of Europe, follows travellers even when he will not attack them; the wolf in the open fields and in unsheltered places, the jaguar skirting the road, and appearing only at intervals between the bushes."
The same illustrious observer also remarks,—
"Near the Joval, nature assumes an awful and savage aspect. We there saw the largest jaguar we had ever met with. The natives themselves were astonished at its prodigious length, which surpassed that of all the tigers of India I had seen in the collections of Europe."
Still these were extraordinary specimens of the race, and leave the fact undoubted, that the most formidable of the western Feræ has no pretensions to an equality with his congener, the tyrant of the jungles of Bengal.
1332. In vain also we look among the tribes of America for a rival in outward appearance to the giraffe, so remarkable for its height, its swan-like neck, gentle habits, and soft expressive eye; while of the animals most serviceable to mankind—the horse, the ox, the ass, the goat, and the hog—not a living example of either was known there before its occupancy by the Europeans. But, however inferior the animal race of the New may be as compared to those of the Old world, the balance between the two appears to have been pretty equal in remote ages; geological discovery has disproved the assertion of Buffon, that the creative force in America in relation to quadrupeds never possessed great vigour, and has established the fact, that it is only the more recent specimens of its energy that are upon an inferior scale. The relics of the unwieldly magatherium, of the gigantic sloth, and armadillo-like animals, discovered in great abundance imbedded in its soil, prove that at a former period it swarmed with monsters of equal bulk with those that now roam in the midst of Africa and Asia. The estuary deposit that forms the plains westward of Buenos Ayres, and covers the gigantic rocks of the Bando Oriental, appears to be the grave of extinct gigantic quadrupeds.
"But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there."—Isaiah xiv.