^793* account of the fat rumpedjheep. 157 



it constitutes their chief riches, the pumher they 

 {)ofsefs being enormous. The Persians also rear it in 

 abundance ; as iikewise the Hottentots, as we are 

 informed by Kolbe in his travels to the Cape of 

 Good Hope; whilst Oibeck in his journey to China, 

 afserts that the fat tailed fheep are reared through 

 that whole empire. 



We know from other authorities, f/'z. Shaw, and 

 the abbe Demanent, two writers quoted in a for- 

 hier article, that the same breed obtains in Syria, 

 Mauritania, and the other regions of Africa, under 

 some modifications oi form, from different causes, so 

 that the doctor thinks he has brought sufficient 

 evidence of what he advanced. in the beginning of this 

 article, i^/z that the steatopyga or fat rumped fheep 

 is the most universally reared and multiplied of 

 any breed in the world. 



Here however the pure unmixed race is only trea-. 

 ted of, as they exist in the vast deserts of Great 

 Tartary, influenced in their form only by pastur- 

 age, soil, air, and water ; no other variety being near 

 10 contaminate their blood. 



The flocks therefore of all the Tartar hordes re- 

 semble one another by a large yellowilh muzzle, the 

 rpper ja-w often projecting beyond the lower ; by 

 long hanging ears; by the horns of the adult ram 

 being large, £piral, wrinkled, angular, and bent in 

 a lunar form. 



The body of the ram, and sometimes of the ewe, 

 sv/ells gradually with fat, towards the posteriors ;. 

 wlieie a solid mafs of fat is formed on the rump, and 

 iallfe over the anus in place of a tail, divided into 



