No; most thankfully, no! Then would matters have
been far less harmoniously, far less benignantly
arranged. It is our greatest consolation to feel assured
that all the physical changes which this earth has
undergone, and every renovation of its inhabitants,
has been from the beginning foreordained by that All-
wise and All-powerful Being, in whose presence the
best and greatest of us would be crushed into nothing-
-ness, did we not, to our comfort, believe that He is not
the Creator merely, but the Father and Protector of
every animated creature. ‘‘ These wait all upon Thee,
that Thou mayest give them meat in due season. When
Thou givest it them, they gather it, and when Thou
openest thy hand, they are filled with good. When
Thou hidest Thy face, they are troubled. When Thou


THE DOME£TIC FOWL. 15


takest away their breath they die, and are turned again
to their dust.”—Dixon,


GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION.
In a wild state, the species of the genus gallus are
at present restricted to India, Malaya, Sumatra, Java,
and perhaps other islands of the neighboring groups, as
well as those scattered over the vast Pacific. How far
to the west, in remote ages, some of these species may
have spread, we know not; some may have been dis-
tributed from India through Persia, even to Mingrelia
and Georgia, anciently Colchis, whence the Greeks
derived the pheasant, which they found on the banks
of the Phasis.
