110 
DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 
price 90 low as to tempt him to be a purchaser. On the other hand, 
the shin must not be thin, like paper, nor flaccid, nor loose in the hand, 
nor flabby. This is the opposite extreme, and is indicative of delicate- 
ness, bad, flabby flesh, and possibly of inaptitude to retain the fat. It 
must be elastic and velvety, soft and pliable, presenting to the touch a 
gentle resistance, but so delicate as to give pleasure to the sensitive 
hand — a skin, in short, which seems at first to give an indentation 
from the pressure of the fingers, but which again rises to its place by a 
gentle elasticity. The hair is of nearly as much importance as the 
skin. A hard skin will have straight and stiff hair ; it will not have a 
curl, but be thinly and lankly distributed equally over the surface. A 
proper grazing animal will have a mossy coat, not absolutely curled, but 
having a disposition to a graceful curl, a semifold, which presents a 
waving inequality, but as different from a close and straightly-laid coat, 
as it is from one standing off the animal at right angles, a strong symp- 
tom of disease. It will also, in a thriving animal, be licked here and 
there with its tongue, a proof that the skin is duly performing its func- 
tions. There must be also the full and goggle eye, bright and pressed 
outward by the fatty bed below, because, as this is a part where nature 
always provides fat, an animal capable of developing it to any consider- 
able extent will have its indications here, at least when it exists in 
excess. 
So much for feeding qualities in the animal, and their conformations 
indicative of this kindly disposition. Next come such formations of the 
animal itself as are favorable to the growth of fat, other things being 
equal. There must be size where large weights are expected. Christ- 
mas-beef, for instance, is expected to be large as well as fat. The symbol 
of festivity should be capacious as well as prime in quality. But it is 
so much a matter of choice and circumstance with the grazier that 
profit alone will be his guide. The axiom will be, however, as a general 
rule, that the better the grazing soil the larger the animal may be ; the 
poorer the soil the smaller the animal. Small animals are unquestion- 
ably much more easily fed, and they are well known by experienced men 
to be those best adapted to second-rate feeding pastures. But beyond 
this there must be breadth of carcass. This is indicative of fattening 
perhaps beyond all other qualifications. If rumps are favorite joints, 
and produce the best price, it is best to have the animal which will grow 
the longest, the broadest, and the best rump ; the same of crop, and the 
same of sirloin j and not only so, but breadth is essential to the con- 
sumption of that quantity of food which is necessary to the development 
of a large amount of fat in the animal. Thus a deep wide chest, favor- 
able for the respiratory and circulating functions, enables it to consume 
a large amount of food, to burn up the sugary matter, and to deposit 
the fatty matter — as then useless for respiration, but hereafter to be 
prized. A full level crop will be of the same physiological utility, while 
abroad and open framework at the hips will afford scope for the action 
of the liver and kidneys. 
There are other points also of much importance ; the head must be 
small and fine ; its special use is indicative of the quick fattening ot the 
animal so constructed, and also it is indicative of the bones being small 
