SHEEP. 



66i 



met with ; [for some naturalists mention it as still 

 occurring in the mountainous parts of the south-east 

 of Spain. 



In their habits these animals have a very close re- 

 semblance to^the common sheep. They assemble 

 and pasture tog-ether in numerous flocks ; and so 

 much is this their habit that, if an individual is kept 

 in solitude, it pines away and very soon dies. As is 

 the case with common sheep, this social instinct ap- 

 pears to be the only one which is very strong in them, 

 and they will follow it even to their personal danger. 

 When kept in confinement, they do not appear to 

 acquire any knowledge of persons, so as to be able 

 to distinguish those who feed and are kind to them 

 from others. When food is presented to them, they 

 come to that; but they do not heed the person who 

 is in the habit of feeding them, unless the food is 

 shown. This is very much the character of common 

 sheep, which are far less intelligent than oxen, and 

 do not appear to know either their owners or their 

 homes. Therefore they must always have a shepherd 

 to conduct them, and lead the flock to where it may 

 be wanted ; for, although they keep together, the 

 whole would wander off, and never return to the fold, 

 unless conducted. 



THE ARGALI. This is the wild sheep of the cen- 

 tral and northern parts of Asia, and has been not 

 unfrequently confounded with the mouflon of Europe. 

 Perhaps they are the same species, and the differences 

 between them are merely climatal, and therefore we 

 have not added the systematic names to the common 

 ones by which they are known. The argali is found 

 in all the mountainous parts of the temperate and the 

 cold regions of Asia, to the eastward of the Caspian, 

 and even in places so cold as Kamtschatka, where it 

 is highly esteemed both for its flesh and its fat. 



South Down Sheep. 



It is an animal rather less than the fallow-deer, but 

 thicker and stouter in the body, and shorter in the 

 legs. The male is considerably larger and stouter 

 than the female. The head has a good deal of resem- 

 blance to that of the common sheep, but the ears are 

 shorter. The horns of the male are not very unlike 

 those of the ram, but they are larger and higher, 

 more compressed, more triangular in their section, 

 more divergent, and also more rough and furrowed. 

 In very old animals they are of great strength and 

 thickness, especially at their bases. The front side 

 is flat or very slightly convex, but toward the point 

 the convexity is greater, and it is very compressed. 

 The interior side is grooved for nearly its whole 

 length ; and the external one is a little convex in the 

 basal part, and a little concave toward the point. 



The internal angle on the front side is the most pro- 

 minent ; and the external of the same is rounded, 

 especially in the old ones. The cross furrows and 

 ridges with which the horn is annulated are very 

 irregular. The female, when full grown, has the 

 horns more elevated and less divergent than the 

 horned ewes of the common sheep. They are com- 

 pressed, flat on their inner surfaces, and convex on 

 their outer. They have the angle of the convex 

 edge rounded, and that on the concave sharp ; but 

 toward the points they are flattened and turned out- 

 wards. Both on the males and the females, these 

 horns begin to make their appearance when the ani- 

 mals are about three months old. They are then 

 semi-oval in their section, and of a black colour. The 

 tail of the argoli is very short, and naked on the 

 under side, the same as in the mouflon. In winter, 

 the colour on the upper part is generally greyish yel- 

 low, with a line of brownish red down the back ; the 

 buttocks bright yellowish ; and the under parts and 

 insides of the legs white. In summer, the colour of 

 the upper part is generally more inclining to red, but 

 the yellow patch on the buttocks surrounding the 

 tail remains of the same colour at all seasons. The 

 hair is very short and smooth, resembling that of the 

 deer, and has hardly anything of a woolly appearance. 

 It is remarkable for the fleetness of its motions and 

 the vigour of its leaps, and in many points of its cha- 

 racter it bears no small resemblance to the deer; 

 though in the more essential ones it is decidedly a 

 sheep, yet certainly more removed from the com- 

 mon sheep of Europe than the mouflon. It is an 

 exceedingly lively and active animal, and its flesh is 

 as much esteemed in the Countries which it inhabits 

 as venison is with us. 



WILD SHEEP OF AMERICA. This is often called 

 the " rocky mountain sheep," under which name a 

 figure of it will be found in the plate SHEEP, which 

 figure will give the reader some notion of the general 

 appearance of the animal. By some the goat of the 

 rocky mountains has been confounded with this 

 animal ; and it has also been called an antelope, 

 though it is neither the one nor the other, but truly 

 and properly a goat. The characters of this species, 

 or probably variety (for it really seems that, not- 

 withstanding all the diversities of the genus Ovis, 

 whether in the wild or the cultivated state, there is 

 no well made out distinction more broad than that 

 of variety), are very apparent, and at once prevent 

 any possibility of confounding it either with the ante- 

 lopes or the goats, though of course, as all sheep do, 

 it approximates more closely to the latter of these 

 than to the former. The bod}' is remarkable for its 

 thickness and roundness in proportion to its length ; 

 the legs are very long ; the outline of the forehead, 

 seen in profile, is nearly straight ; and the muzzle is 

 almost exactly that of the common sheep. The 

 horns of the male are very thick and large ; they 

 advance in front of the eyes, and form nearly an 

 entire turn of a spiral. They are flattened laterally 

 like those of the domestic rani, and have similar 

 transverse furrows and ridges. These furrows and 

 ridges are very conspicuous on the basal half of the 

 length of the horn, but much less so on the terminal 

 half; and of the three lateral faces the front one is 

 the largest. The horns of the female are much 

 more slender than those of the male ; they are com- 

 pressed, nearly straight, and without furrows ; there 

 are, in some instances, plates .or folds of skin under 



