anhnals they fpeak of? or did they not judge of them by fight, or per- haps even from report only? Were they acquainted with the animals of their own country, with which they undertake to compare them? Have they not been fo ignorant as often to miftake the fpecies? A true anfvver to thefe queftions would probably lighten their authority, fo as to render it infufficient for the foundation of an hypothefis. How unripe we yet are, for an accurate comparifon of the animals of the two countries, will appear from the work of Monfieur de Buffon. The ideas we fliould have formed of the fizes of fome animals, from the information he had received at his firfl: publications con- cerning them, are very different from what his fubfequent communications give us. And indeed his candour in this can never be too much praifed. One fentence of his bookmuft do him immortal honour.
' J'aime autantune perfonne qui me releve d'une erreur, qu'une autre qui m'apprend une verite, parce qu'en efFet une erreur corrigee eft une verite'^. He feem.s to * Quad. IX. 138.
have thought the cabiai he firft exammed wanted Uttle of its full growth. * II n'etoit pas encore tout-a-fait adulte*\ Yet he weighed but 46ilb. and he found after- wardst> that thefe animals, when full grown, weigh loolb. He had fuppofed, from the examination of a jaugar J, faid to be two years old, which weighed but 1 61b.
1 2 oz. that when he fliould have acquired his full growth, he would not be larger than a middle fized dog. But a fubfe- quent account]! raifes his weight to 2oolb.
Further information will, doubtlefs, pro- duce further correftions. The wonder is, not that there is yet fomething in this great work to correal, but that there is fo little. The refult of this view then is, that of 26 quadrupeds common to both countries, 7 are faid to be larger in Ame- rica, 7 of equal fize, and 1 2 not fufficiently examined. So that the firft