as indicative of the Age of the Animal. 
835 
riably has a given number of teeth when born. Generally, how- 
ever, the first and second pairs of temporary incisors, the four 
teeth most centrally situated, arc cut by the time the lamb is a 
week old. By tlie ninth or tenth day the third pair usually 
comes through, but the fourth or last pair is rarely put up until 
about the end of the fourth or beginning- of the fifth week. The 
temporary molars, three in number on either side of the upper 
and lower jaws, though uncut at birth, are fairly through the 
gums by the third week of the animal's age. 
A marked difference exists with regard to the relative sizes of 
the different pairs of incisors. The central teeth are broader 
and longer than the second pair, which also exceeds the third, as 
the third does the fourth. In these particulars as in several 
others, the temporary incisors are the counterparts of the per- 
manent, which succeed them. They are however very much 
smaller than the permanent. 
The number of both the temporary and permanent sets of 
teeth of the sheeji is the same as in the ox. The temporary 
incisors are eight, the temporary molars twelve, and when den- 
tition is perfected by the changing of these teeth and tlie putting 
up of twelve more molars, the total number in both animals is 
thirty-two ; namely, eight incisors, and twenty-four molars. The 
temporary molars are likewise similar in form to the permanent, 
altliough smaller, excepting the third molar of the lov/er jaw, 
which, like the corresponding temporary tooth of the ox and pig, 
is composed of three principal parts or lobes blended together. 
About the third week of the lamb's age, both incisors and molars 
are so well developed as to enable the young animal to crop the 
grass and live comparatively independent of its dam. Hence the 
pi-opriety of so arranging the sheepfold, as is now done by most 
farmers, that the lambs can pass in and out at will and cull the 
herbage before the ewes are allowed, by the shifting of the fold, 
to come upon the same ground. 
Before proceeding further in the description of the dentition 
of the sheep, I may remark that but little has been written on this 
subject which is trustworthy. The account given by authors of 
the teething of this animal does not differ in any essential parti- 
cular from the following, which is quoted from the work entitled 
' Sheep :' — 
" The mouth of the lamb newly dropped," says the author (Mr. Youatt), 
" is cithei- without incisor teeth or it has two. The teeth rapidly succeed to each 
other, and before the animal is a month old he has the whole eight. They 
continue to grow with his growth until he is about fourteen or sixteen months 
old. . . . Then with the same previous process of diminution which was 
described in Cattle, or carried to a still greater degree, the two central 
teeth are shed and attain their full growth when the sheep is two years old. 
. . . Between two and three years old the two next incisors are shed, and 
z 2 
