262 THE PRINCIPLES OF AGRICULTURE 



breeder;" although prepotency can be positively 

 known only by the character of the offspring. 



484-. The following are more or less certain 

 indications of prepotency: the eyes are bright, 

 wide open, alert, fairly wide apart and somewhat 

 protruding, or the rev^erse of sunken. The hair 

 is fine and soft, the skin neither thick and 

 leathery nor too thin or "papery," nor of flabby 

 structure. The bones are of moderate size and 

 have the appearance of being fine grained and 

 strong, as indicated by head, limbs, feet and 

 horns. Such animals are usually symmetrical, 

 although they may not be fat. In of all their 

 movements they are vigorous, alert and powerful 

 and, above all, courageous. 



485. Now and then a "sport" appears, — an 

 animal which has some new or strange feature, 

 something that we have rarely or never seen 

 before in that breed (as a hornless or muley 

 animal amongst normally horned animals). Such 

 occasional characters are usually not easily per- 

 petuated, though sports have been the origin of 

 many stable types, especially among plants. Per- 

 manent improvement is more likely to be secured 

 by slow, small, steady augmentation, not by leaps 

 and bounds. 



483. The longer any line of animals is bred 

 to a single ideal or standard, the more uniform 

 the animals become. The breed or the family 



