324 
On the Teeth of the Ox, Sheep, and Pig, 
diet. It is, therefore, that we see it principally among; our 
competing breeds of Short-horns, Herefords and Devons. Such 
cases, however, are met with in other breeds, and even more 
frequently than is generally supposed. 
In the preparation of the tables which accompany this description, 
this date has been taken as one of the standards of comparison by 
which the limits of the range of dentition may be ascertained. 
Many oxen, however, do not put up the first pair of permanent 
incisors until they have passed their second year ; a fact which 
at once shows that a single average table would have been next 
to useless in assisting our decisions in doubtful cases of age. 
Fig. 27.* 
UTT I N G S' 
Very soon after penetrating the gums, these two central teeth ac- 
quire a heiglit equal to that represented in fig. 27. At first they 
press somewhat against each other for want of space, but this soon 
yields to the altered position they take when tiieir broad chisel- 
shaped crowns are clear of the jaw and their fangs properly 
located within their sockets. The thinness of the bony partitions 
between the sockets and the spongy nature of the bone, as a 
whole, often leads to the permanent incisors pressing the fangs 
of the temporary closer together, so that these teeth will have 
a more compact appearance than before the permanent were cut. 
* Fig. 27. Front view of the lower jaw of an ox at one year and ten mouths old, 
showing that the ceutralpair of permanent incisors, 1,1, are well up. Natural size. 
