VIII. CREATION BY LAW.

quantities and watch carefully, and the required variety is always found, and can be increased to almost any desired extent. In Sheep, we get flesh, fat, and wool; in Cows, milk; in Horses, colour, strength, size, and speed; in Poultry, we have got almost any variety of colour, curious modifications of plumage, and the capacity of perpetual egg-laying. In Pigeons we have a still more remarkable proof of the universality of variation, for it has been at one time or another the fancy of breeders to change the form of every part of these birds, and they have never found the required variations absent. The form, size, and shape of bill and feet, have been changed to such a degree as is found only in distinct genera of wild birds; the number of tail feathers has been increased, a character which is generally one of the most permanent nature, and is of high importance in the classification of birds; and the size, the colour, and the habits, have been also changed to a marvellous extent. In Dogs, the degree of modification and the facility with which it is effected, is almost equally apparent. Look at the constant amount of variation in opposite directions that must have been going on, to develop the poodle and the greyhound from the same original stock! Instincts, habits, intelligence, size, speed, form, and colour, have always varied, so as to produce the very races which the wants or fancies or passions of men may have led them to desire.