30 Essai/ on Sheep. 



which, in addition, gave him a comfortable 

 meal, or what is still more valuable among 

 savages, plenty of grease for his toilet and his 

 kitchen ? This circumstance alone would make 

 him attentive to cherish and propagate the de- 

 formity; and the rather, as he must soon have 

 found that it was attended with another import- 

 ant advantage; the sheep being more un wield- 

 ly, would be less apt to stray or return to its 

 savage state; an object of considerable import- 

 ance in the early state of society. We find at 

 this moment a deformity in sheep cultivated 

 with attention among ourselves. An accidental 

 variety of sheep have been found here with 

 short crooked legs, such, in fact, as to cripple 

 them, and to make motion, as I should think, 

 painful to them. These, called the Otter Sheep, 

 are valued for this deformity, because it disa- 

 bles them from straying or leaping over walls 

 or fences ; and what was at first probably an 

 accidental circumstance, has become the basis 

 of a new and unsightly race. If a civilized 

 nation, with whom taste has formed a standard 

 for beauty, can consent to cripple God's works, 

 and erect an altar to deformity, whereon to sa- 

 crifice the enjoyments of a helpless and useful 

 animal, why should we be surprized, that sava- 

 ges, ignorant of the beauty of proportion and 



