OF CATTLE, ET AL. 305 



" Probably, no two individuals are identically the 

 same:" no two "are of a face:" "the shepherd knows 

 each sheep, and man can distinguish a fellow-man, out 

 millions, upon millions, of other men:'" and "Shep- 

 herds have won wagers, by recognizing each sheep, 

 in a flock of a hundred, which they had never seen, 

 until the previous fortnight." 



Now, this power of discrimination, — based as it is, 

 upon the conscious, or unconscious perception of fea- 

 tures, peculiar to the individuals so distinguished, — gen- 

 erally implies, that there are many positive points of 

 structure, which even a seemingly perfect and symmet- 

 rical individual must lack. Many, therefore, of these 

 little features, — just recognizable by a practiced eye, — 

 when added up, make a sum of defects, which is calcu- 

 lated to tell, after many generations of close-inter- 

 breeding. 



In a cow, for instance, in which it would be difficult 

 to see, wherein the animal was in any wise deficient, 

 there may yet be some slight detail of proportion,, 

 wanting, in every one of the following characters : in 

 the horns, in the legs, in the hoofs, in the ears, in the 

 eyes, in the tail, in the nostrils, in the muzzle, in the 

 coating of hair, in the neck, in the chest, in the ribs 

 (defected slightly, for instance, from the true curve, or 

 arch), in the shoulder, in the rump, in the vertebrse, 

 and in numberless other characters, both internal, and 

 external. 



When two individuals, which are similarly defective 

 in these almost infinitesimal points, are matched, they 

 will not be susceptible, to any appreciable degree, of 

 evil ; but will, for many generations, rather, go on im- 



