WINTER MANAGEMENT. 231 



to make flesh and fat, how these qualities could be improved, 

 and what particular shape or form is connected with this 

 propensity to fatten ? But though the above has been per- 

 haps the principal consideration in view, there are other 

 subordinate ones springing out of it of scarcely inferior im- 

 portance — such as which breed, or individual sheep, will fat- 

 ten soonest on good pasture ? Which on indifferent or bad 

 pasture ? Which has the earliest maturity ? Which can 

 bear wet and dirt with the greatest impunity, or can best 

 endure exposure to the weather in a cold and severe lo- 

 cality ? 



" These several points must all enter into the consideration 

 of the sheep-owner, vvho must of course pay the utmost at- 

 tention to the nature and quality of his land and its suitability 

 for particular sheep, being, after all, governed by the ultimate 

 calculation as to which brings in the greatest return of profit. 



" The various points in the form of a sheep, connected 

 with the aptitude to fatten, have received the utmost atten- 

 tion from practical and sagacious breeders, although some of 

 these points are still matters of dispute. The superiority of 

 particular improved breeds is now generally acknowledged, 

 and may be considered to be established on certain principles, 

 though in arriving at these principles it must be confessed 

 that we are little indebted to science, but to the long and at- 

 tentive observation and correct reasoninor of sagacious and 

 practical men. It is, indeed, only very lately that anything 

 like a correct explanation could be offered for the various phe- 

 nomena that attend the fattening of animals, or why one 

 description of food should be more suitable for the purpose 

 than another. It had, indeed, been laid down as a fact, that 

 a large capacious chest and lungs were necessary for the 

 production of fat, and that its secretion depended in a great 

 degree on the quantity of air that could be respired ; whilst 

 the researches of modern chemists have shown that nothing 

 could be fmlher from the truth. And now that the fallacy 

 has been exposed by chemistry it can also be readily shown 

 by anatomy, for we find that whilst the horse and the camel 

 have eighteen ribs, the ox and the sheep have only thirteen. 

 The absence of these five pair of ribs must of course mate- 

 rially diminish the cavity of the chest, and its greater breadth 

 (necessary for another purpose) does not by any means com- 

 pensate for its diminished length. Animals of speed have 

 rarely a propensity to fatten, but in greyhounds, foxes, deer, 



