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be kept and brought up in some such manner. Goats, again, require very little looking after; they can get a living almost anywhere, and will remain in the vicinity of their owners without much herding. Hence they would suit the indolent disposition of savages far better than would animals which require constant attention. Many of the African races seem to show little or no faculty for keeping domestic animals, but one finds that most of them have a few tame goats about their villages.

Another reason why it seems likely that goats have been domesticated for a very long time is the great number of varieties which now exist. Some of these have certain remarkable peculiarities which could only be produced by many generations of careful breeding. Thus the ears of one kind are so enormously developed as to be 19 inches in length and 43 inches in breadth. Others have an extra pair of horns; and it is stated by one French writer that in Nubia they have actually developed a breed which has no goat-like odour. It seems likely that the milking qualities of the goat would be appreciated by primitive people, who would be quite unable to turn the wool of the sheep to practical account; and since sheep, when removed from their mountain home, require very much more care than do goats, I should be inclined to give the latter the prior place in the history of domestication.

Attention has been drawn by naturalists to the love of thistles displayed by the donkey, and the hint it gives us as to his desert origin. The goat has some peculiarities of taste of an equally extraordinary character, which may be interpreted by studying the kind of vegetation which thrives

in his ancestral habitat. A goat will cheerfully munch up strong cavendish tobacco, cigar-ends, wormwood, red chillies, or almost any vegetable substance the pungency or nauseousness of which deters other animals. Now we find that among the Southern rocks nearly every herb and shrub has a markedly bitter or aromatic character, partly induced, doubtless, by the abundant sunshine, and partly as a defence from the depredations of animal life. That the goat is indifferent to some of the most deterrent flavours is probably due to the fact that for many generations he has been obliged to exist upon highly spiced pabulum of this kind.

One peculiarity of the goat I only venture to mention (not that he is reticent on the subject himself), because it illustrates by what diverse means nature attains like ends. Now among animals and plants, as well as in the commercial world, the business of life cannot be done without advertisement. The wild ass uses his sonorous voice in proclaiming his presence to all whom it may concern within the radius of half a mile.

The goat has a comparatively feeble voice, and yet he also has occasion to make himself known to any friends or rivals who may be in his neighbourhood. He does it silently-but in this instance silence is wholly unconnected with modesty. He so arranges matters as to make it abundantly evident to the nostrils of every living thing within an area quite equal to that dominated by the voice of the ass, that he is at home.

Professor Lloyd Morgan, in one of his delightful books about animals, indulges in what Louis Stevenson describes as a romantic evasion," when he speaks of

the "natural patchouli" of the billy-goat. Whether the use of this somewhat strained euphemism be due to respect for a national emblem of the Welsh, or whether the learned and gentle Professor desires to lessen the inevitable shock to our feelings which must ensue from his further assertion that that most worthy and respectable female, the nanny-goat, takes a gross pleasure in the effluvium, I cannot say. Professor Lloyd Morgan's statements are worthy of all respect; but, if I have any choice in the matter, I would much rather believe that feminine taste, however capricious, could never sink to such abyssmal depravity. Needless to say, this wild trait in the goat is not one which man has studiously cultivated. There may have been circumstances under which it took its place among the virtues where, in fact, it contributed to that "odour of sanctity" demanded by hircine moral ideals. But we

will avoid the risk of mental overstrain by not striving to explain or imagine how such could ever have been the case.

The goat being a mountain animal is well protected against the cold, and we find that in some varieties there is a most abundant fleece of soft, silk-like wool. But the wool of the goat differs materially from that of the sheep, and the reason is not difficult to explain. Goats, from their habit of browsing among shrubs, need to be able to force their way through thickets without injury either to their coats or to their skin; whereas the sheep, living on the open hillside, is enveloped in a covering which is merely calculated for warmth, and is not fitted to stand much tear and wear. Hence we find that the wool of the goat does not "felt" and become tangled together in

a mass like that of the sheep. Microscopically the fibres are much smoother and more compact, and lack the saw-like edges of true wool. In fact the silky fleece of the Angora goat reminds one of the soft locks which grow on the head and beneath the coarser hair of the Skye terrier. Man has found that this special adaptation of the goat's natural covering to bear friction among rocks and thorns is a most opportune fact when he uses the wool for his own purposes. Some of the very toughest and most durable fabrics we have (such as that now largely used for umbrellas) are made of goat's hair. For long ages the Cashmere goat has been shorn to make the beautiful materials woven by natives of that country. The history of the introduction of mohair (which is the wool of the Angora goat) is one of the well-known romances of the history of commerce. It is now used in enormous quantities in the manufacture of soft wear-resisting fabrics.

A comparison of the horns of the sheep with those of the goat also reveals to us the difference of habit which has so affected the fleece in the two animals. The spiral horns of the wild sheep are exceedingly ill adapted for passing through thickets, because it is obvious that they would constantly become entangled and hinder the progress of the animal. Among some very ancient records of human affairs we find an example of this-for did not Abraham find "a ram caught in a thicket by his horns" when he was about to sacrifice Isaac? The very fact that a sheep usually is unable to disentangle himself if hung up in the bushes proves that the position is an unaccustomed one; although it does seem rather odd that fight

ing rams, whose horns have become hooked together, and who, one would think, would be well used to such an accident, seldom have the sense to make the half turn of their corkscrew-like weapons which would suffice to set both prisoners of war at liberty. Instances have been known of sheep having perished, head to head, because they had not sufficient wit-or possibly too much obstinacy to detach themselves from one another.

Now the horns of the goat are never curled so as to make it dangerous for him to pass through tangled briers or closely set underwood. He has merely to lift his nose and his horns lie back on each side of his spine or curve down his shoulders and serve as a protection for his body when he is forcing his way among the thorny scrub of the hillside.

As regards the future of the goat one can now speak rather more cheerfully than would have been possible before the hidden excellences of his fleece were discovered. Until comparatively lately the general tendency has been for the goat to act merely as a kind of temporary stop-gap among domestic animals, for we find that advancing civilisation has almost always replaced him by others whose serviceable qualities have proved better adapted to human needs. In fact, his fate has been that of the "jackof-all-trades" who is "master of none" all the world over. But there are some regions of the earth where his star is decidedly in the ascendant, and where it is

not likely to decline for a very long time. On the exposed and parched tablelands of South Africa, where at one time antelopes innumerable found sustenance, goats, probably because of their kinship to the antelope family, thrive far better than do any other domestic animals. The thorny shrubs and brown shrivelled herbage of the Karroo, which seems to the European traveller to be of the most unpromising character as fodder, afford him abundant nourishment.

Not long ago, it may be remembered, a well-known South African statesman went on a mysterious visit to the Sultan of Turkey. As this gentleman is popularly supposed to be always engaged in some deep and dreadful plot, sundry disquieting rumours got afloat as to the purport of his mission. At last some keen-witted journalist wormed out the awful secret. It was this: His Highness the Padishah happened to possess some particularly fine Angora goats, and the statesman in question was desirous of "doing a deal" with him, so as to improve the output of Cape mohair.

Although, when this Machiavellian piece of statecraft was laid bare, some people laughed and said that the newspaper men had found another mare's nest, the future will probably show that this patriarchal piece of traffic has done more for the permanent prosperity of South Africa than “all the gold of the Rand."

LOUIS ROBINSON.

RECENT NAVAL BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM.

THE most significant thing about this batch of books is that they should exist at all. Ten years ago their appearance would have been a portent; they could never have appeared at all. Here, published within six months of each other, are five volumes, all of them dealing more or less directly with our maritime defence. Among their authors are representatives of navy, army, and marines, along with two male civilians and a woman. The books and their authors are of themselves an indisputable testimony to the existence in this country of some degree of public knowledge and a vast deal of public interest in naval affairs, which certainly did not exist as late as 1887. That, to begin with, is matter for sincere national selfgratulation. If our Navy is not yet all it ought to be, at least ignorance no longer affords any valid excuse for apathy. The nation is to day more widely awake to its fundamental interest than it has ever been without the harsh admonition of actual war.

Of this strange, but wholly commendable, direction of public at tention towards the Navy, the most striking evidence, no doubt, is furnished by the two biographies which we here place at the head of our list. In the adventures of fighting men, so long as they are fighting, a persistently unregener

ate world never ceases to interest itself. But until a very few years ago there was no spark of interest in admirals as such. It would have been hopeless to ask people to concern themselves with a dead admiral merely because in time of peace he did good work for the service. It is true that Hornby and Tryon, each in his day, was the real, if not the nominal, leader of the Navy. But Tryon never saw powder burned in earnest after the Crimean War, when he was under twenty-four, while Hornby's one experience of active service was the operations in Syria against Ibrahim Pasha when he

was

a midshipman of fourteen. Later, each became in turn the foremost tactician of his daybut who cared about naval tactics? Each became the idol, almost the infallible Pope, of the service-but who cared what naval officers thought of their leaders? To-day, most happily, we have changed all that. The Navy is healthier, and so is the popular attitude towards it. And the sole interest of the two books-which interest, we are assured, will be wide and deepis that the two men here pictured did more, probably, to promote this healthier habit than any others of their time. Because we are beginning to appreciate the Navy, we are also able to appreciate its makers.

A Biography. By

Admiral of the Fleet Sir Geoffrey Phipps Hornby, G.C.B. Mrs Fred. Egerton. Edinburgh and London: Wm. Blackwood & Sons. The Life of Admiral Sir George Tryon. By Rear-Admiral C. C. Penrose Fitzgerald. Edinburgh and London: Wm. Blackwood & Sons.

Naval Policy. By G. W. Steevens. London: Methuen & Co.

The Effect of Maritime Command on Land Campaigns since Waterloo. By Major C. E. Callwell, R. A. Edinburgh and London: Wm. Blackwood & Sons. The Navy and the Nation. By James R. Thursfield and Lieut.-Col. Sir George Sydenham Clarke, K.C.M.G. London: John Murray.

To attempt a nice comparison between the biographies would be rather difficult and quite profitless. As the presentation of a man Mrs Egerton's life of her father is not unnaturally the more successful; as an estimate of work done for the Navy Admiral Fitzgerald's book as naturally displays the more mastery. But this does not mean that either is deficient on the side where it is excelled by the other. Quite the contrary. Nothing, for example, could be much better than the portrait of Tryon which Admiral Fitzgerald draws in his introductory chapter: in the terse dignity and rhythm of its language it rather recalls North's Plutarch than the weaker biographies of today :

:

"Sir George Tryon was a man of tall stature and of a commanding presence; latterly he was also broad and stout-in fact, a portly figure but it was significantly remarked of him that his heart was big enough for his body. Some thought his manners brusque; some said they were imperious; but none ever denied the kindness of his heart, or his great generosity, in the most universal and best sense of the word. . . . There was generally a merry twinkle in Tryon's eye, and he was very fond of a joke, but he never allowed his

love of fun to interfere with the strict performance of his duty. He was of a restless and energetic disposition, but although he never spared himself he showed great consideration for the comfort of others. . . . He was undoubtedly ambitious, with the worthy ambition of genius: he knew he was clever-most clever men doand he was not only content, but proud, to devote his talents entirely to the development, the organisation, and the improvement of every detail of his beloved profession. ... By his contemporaries he was almost universally beloved, and he was 'dear old George' to them; and if perhaps his brilliant qualities, and the devotion with which he was generally regarded, excited in the breasts of

any of them some faint twinges of jealousy, it was but the usual tribute which mediocrity pays to exceptional ability."

Mrs Egerton's book contains no such formal appreciation of its subject; but the great number of private and public letters leaves a very distinct impression of "Uncle Geoff's" character. Modest, though without that affected self-depreciation which is immodesty under a mask; buoyant yet cautious; keen but always considerate; in dead earnest about his work, but genial and charitable even to First Lords of the Admiralty; knowing his own mind, but always remembering that other people had minds too; passionately loving the sea and the service, but loving his home and trees, his horses and dogs, hardly less,—we may say confidently that biography has hardly revealed a more completely lovable temperament. Mrs Egerton has drawn the portrait with a due tempering of tenderness and dignity which it is the happiness of few biographers to attain.

This said, we may leave the personal traits of both men to the appreciation of those who love loyalty, duty, and kindliness,

whether it be found in admiral or peasant. On the professional side the one was the direct successor of the other. Hornby bridged the gulf between sails and steam, wooden frigates and compound - armoured barbette ships. Tryon entered in the flower of his life into the age of ironclad steamers; he was the first commander of the Warrior, the first British sea-going ironclad. Hornby stands for the transition; Tryon for the development. In Hornby you find the gracious regret for the days of sails and spars; in Tryon the frank, clear-sighted ac

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