_ largest of our domestic sheep. 
ARGALI. 239 
nutritious herbage of summer. They likewise 
frequent the salt marshes which everywhere 
abound in Siberia, and even lick the saline efflo- 
rescence which rises on the ground; and, from 
the effects of the salt upon their constitution, 
they speedily acquire plumpness, and regain 
vigour, flesh, and firmness which they had lost 
during the low feeding of winter and the purging 
course of spring. 
The Armenian argali is allied to the Corsican 
mouflon, and seems less remote from the domes- 
tic sheep in configuration and habits than the 
Siberian argali. Specimens of it from Erzeroom 
may be seen in the gardens of the London Zoo- 
logical society. The males are very pugnacious 
with one another, and have been known to strew 
a spot with their horns, knocked off during their 
contests.” 
The argali of the Rocky mountains of America 
—figured in Plate IV. of our work, Nos. 2 and 3— 
is well known to the Indians and fur-traders of 
Canada. It is larger than any of the argali of 
the old world, and consequently taller than the 
Its fur during 
summer is of a grayish fawn, generally having 
along the back a deeper yellow or reddish line. 
The fur of the old rams in spring is nearly 
white. The face and the nose are white; and 
the tail and haunches are distinguished by the 
same kind of buff-coloured disc as the argali 
of Siberia. The horns of the male are very large, 
and approach, yet do not touch one another at 
the base; and the horns of the female are small 
and slightly curved. These animals live and move 
| in flocks, under the guidance of a leader; they 
_ pasture on the steepest parts of the mountains 
_ in summer, and descend into the plains on the 
' approach of winter; they are wild and timid, 
and flee, on the least alarm, to the most inacces- 
sible parts of the mountains; and they are 
_ hunted and killed by the Indians for the sake 
of both their flesh and their skins. 
Africa has its argali, and in all likelihood 
| more than one variety of the species; for it 
does not appear that the specimen described 
by Dr. Caius, and that discovered by M. Geof- 
roy St. Hilaire in the mountains of Egypt, can 
be viewed otherwise than as varieties of the 
same species ; that figured by Mr. Pennant may 
be altogether distinct. The O. 7ragelaphus, de- 
scribed by Caius about 1561, brought from the 
mountains of Mauritania, Morocco, was larger 
than a fallow-deer, or nearly equal to a stag, be- 
| ing three feet six inches at the shoulder, and four 
feet six from the nape of the neck to the tail. 
The head, from the nostrils to the vertex, one 
foot three inches; the horns one foot one inch 
and a half in circumference at base, one inch 
asunder on the head, bending back and down- 
wards, angular, black, two feet one inch long, 
and wrinkled; the ears small; a beard formed 
by hairs on the cheeks, and under-jaw dividing 
into two lobes; the neck thick, of no great 
length, and beneath it a quantity of long hairs 
hanging from the throat to the knees ; a setaceous 
mane stood up along the neck, and in particular 
about the withers, where it was tufted, long, and 
erect, and of the same colour, or somewhat darker 
than that of the rest of the body, which resem- 
bles the winter dress of a stag, or blackish-rufous ; 
the knees, protected by long and dense hairs 
which seem intended to protect them in bound- 
ing, were bent backwards, but without a callosity; 
the legs were slender, and the external hoofs of 
the fore-feet longer than the internal; the in- 
cisors were only six in number; the nostrils 
black, divided by a perpendicular line of the 
same colour. It was gentle, petulant, and las- 
civious, fond of ascending high places and roofs 
of houses; it could run swiftly and bound prodi- 
giously. According to Caius the females are larger 
than the males, but are not provided with a simi- 
lar luxuriant mane; but on this head he does not 
seem to speak from personal observation. 
Pliny notices the musmon, musimon, and 
ophion. In Candia, it is said, the 0. Musmon is 
still to be found. The mountaineers of Sardinia 
and Corsica are well acquainted with it, by the 
name of mufro, and in former ages it abounded 
in Spain, and, probably, in all the high primitive 
chains of mountains in temperate Europe. 
one species of ovis can make a direct claim to 
the progenitorship of the domestic breeds more 
than another, it would be the musmon and the 
last-described variety of Africa, which by the 
structure of its horns is more allied to musmon 
than to ammon; both having proved that the 
intermixture with domestic sheep is readily ac- 
complished, and the intermediate breed prolific. 
It is probable that African sheep first peopled 
the south and west of Hurope, perhaps as early 
as the Asiatic, which may have spread themselves | 
over Greece, Sicily, and the east of Italy; but a 
later period may be assigned to those which 
came round the Black sea into the valley of the 
Danube ; the northern nations of wooded Europe | 
could not maintain them till a period compara- 
tively recent. 
The Corsican musmon, like the African animal, 
has the horns shorter than the other argalis, 
usually not exceeding one and a half the length 
of the head, curved backwards, and the points 
turned inwards. In general the colour of the 
fur is a brownish or liver-coloured gray, with 
more or less white upon the face and legs ; there 
is also a tuft of long hair beneath the throat, and 
a darker streak along the back and on the flanks. 
But they sometimes vary in colour, being marked 
with large black spaces, particularly about the 
neck, resembling, in this particular, the domes- 
tic breeds both in Africa and India, which ap- 
pear to be nearest the original stock. The fe- 
males are in general without horns, and of all the 
wild species of the sheep they have the chaffron 
most arched, and are said to be the least intelli- 
gent and hardy. Of the facility of breeding this 
Nt | 
f a 
