SHEEP. 



CHAPTER XVII. 



SHEEP. 



With the exception of the dog, there is no one of the brut*; 

 creation which exhibits the diversity of size, color, form, 

 covering and general appearance which characterises the 

 li'N'p, and none which occupies a wider range of climate, or 

 subsists on a greater variety of food. In every latitude be- 

 tween the equator and the arctic, he ranges over sterile 

 mountains, and through the fertile rallies. He feeds on 

 almost every species of edible forage, the cultivated grasses, 

 clovers, cereals and roots ; he browses on aromatic and bitter 

 lirrhs ; he crops the leaves and bark from the stunted forest 

 shrubs, and the pungent, resinous evergreens. In some parts 

 of Norway and Sweden, when other resources fail, he sub- 

 sists on fish or flesh during their long and rigorous winters, 

 and if reduced to necessity, he eats his own wool. He is 

 diminutive like the Orkney, or massive like the Teeswater. 

 He is policerate or many horned ; he has two large or small 

 spiral horns like the Merino, or is polled or hornless like 

 the mutton sheep. He has a long tail like our own breeds ; 

 a broad tail, like many of the eastern, or a mere button of a 

 tail, like the fat-rumps, discernible only by the touch. His 

 coat is sometimes long and coarse, like the Lincolnshire ; 

 short and hairy, like those of Madagascar ; soft and furry, 

 like the Angola, or fine and spiral, like the silken Saxon. 

 Their color, either pure or fancifully mixed, varies from the 

 white or black of our own country, to every shade of brown, 

 dimn, bufl; blue, and Jgrey, like the spotted flocks of the 

 Cape of Good Hope and other parts of Africa and Asia. 

 This wide diversity is the result of long domestication, under 

 almost every conceivable variety of condition. 



USES. Among the antediluvians, sheep were immolated 

 for sacriiicial offerings, and their fleeces probably furnished 

 them with clothing. Since the deluge, their flesh has with 

 all nations, been used as a favorite food for man ; and by the 



