Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/89

Rh 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. But what are their greateſt weights, I cannot ſay. A large ſheep here weighs 100lb. I obſerve Mons. D'Aubenton calls a ram of 62lb. one of the middle ſize. 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. The weights actually known and ſtated in the third table preceding will ſuffice to ſhow, 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 together. By theſe it appears that there are an hundred ſpecies aboriginal of America. Mons. de Buffon ſuppoſes about double that number exiſting on the whole earth. Of theſe Europe, Aſia, and Africa furniſh ſuppoſe 126; that this, the 26 common to Europe and America, and about 100 which are not in America at all. The American ſpecies then are to thoſe of the reſt of the earth, as 100 to 126, or 4 to 5. But the reſidue of the earth