MAMMALIA. 269 



presented to the Wernerian Society of Edinburgh, was submitted to a competent 

 judge, who reported that " the wool, which forms the chief covering of the skin, 

 is fully an inch and a half long, and is of the very finest quality. It is unlike the 

 fleece of the common sheep, which contains a variety of different kinds of wool 

 suitable to the fabrication of articles very dissimilar in their nature, and requires 

 much care to distribute them in their proper order. The fleece under considera- 

 tion is wholly fine. That on the forepart of the skin has all the apparent qualities 

 of wool : on the back part it very much resembles cotton. The whole fleece is 

 much mixed with hairs, and on those parts where the hairs are long and pendant, 

 there is almost no wool." In consequence of this report, a suggestion was made 

 to the Highland Society of the advantage likely to accrue from the introduction 

 into Scotland of an animal bearing so valuable a fleece. The Hudson's Bay 

 Company alone possess the power of effecting this patriotic design. Very lately 

 that Company presented a perfect specimen of the goat to the Zoological Society, 

 from which the accompanying etching was executed by Landseer. From the 

 circumstance of this animal bearing wool, it has been occasionally termed a sheep 

 by the voyagers and even by naturalists ; and as it has often gone by the same 

 name with the Rocky Mountain sheep of the following article, some little confusion 

 has crept into the accounts of their habits which have been published from the 

 reports of the traders. 



The Rocky Mountain goat inhabits the most lofty peaks of the range, from 

 whence it derives its English appellation, seldom descending so near the low 

 country as the Rocky Mountain sheep does. Mr. Drummond saw no goats on- 

 the eastern declivity of the mountains near the sources of the Elk River, where the 

 sheep are numerous, but he learnt from the Indians that they frequent the steepest 

 precipices, and are much more difficult to procure than the sheep. Their 

 manners are said to resemble greatly those of the domestic goat. The exact 

 limits of the range of this animal have not been ascertained, but it probably 

 extends from the 40th to the 64th or 65th degree of latitude. It is common 

 on the elevated part of the Rocky Mountain range that gives origin to four great 

 tributaries to as many different seas, viz. the Mackenzie, the Columbia, the 

 Nelson, and the Missouri Rivers. 



The fine wool which the animal produces grows principally on the back and 

 hips, and is intermixed with long coarse hair. Its flesh is hard and dry, and is 

 little esteemed*. The Indians make caps and saddles of its skin. I have 

 followed Dr. Harlan in ranking this quadruped in the genus Capra, and have 



* Mr. Donald M'Kenzie says, its flesh has a musky flavour.— Harlan, Fauna, p. 258. 



