QI2 Marvels of the Universe 
burden by fastening the tail to a board, often mounted on wheels. Here, again, neither freakish- 
ness nor ornament has been aimed at, but use, for in times of drought the fat on this tail is slowly 
absorbed, so that the tail, like that of certain wild animals, is a reserve store of food. 
The Fat-rumped Sheep is found in many parts of Central Asia, Arabia, Persia, and North-East 
Africa. Here the tail is short, and the fat is accumulated on the buttocks. In Central Asia both 
a black and white strain are kept, the lambs of the former yielding the famous Astrachan “ fur.” 
Usually these sheep are piebald. 
The Wild Sheep is a horned animal. Under domestication these horns have been bred out in 
some breeds, and multiplied in others, as in the case of sheep found in such remote regions of the 
world as Africa and the Hebrides. In the strange Wallachian Sheep they have become twisted 
like a cork-screw, so as to recall the 
horns of the Kudu antelope. This 
duplication of the horns is due to the 
duplication of the original pair, and a 
skull in the British Museum shows this 
process of splitting in its initial stages. 
The smallest breed of sheep in 
existence is the tiny Maned Sheep of 
the Cameroons, and it is significant 
that limb-bones agreeing in size and 
conformation with those of this diminu- 
tive race have been discovered in 
Wiltshire. An adult ram of this 
dwarf breed stands only nineteen 
inches high at the withers. Most of 
the body is covered with hair about 
an inch long, but in the neck it is 
lengthened to form a kind of mane, 
and there is also a ruff on the throat. 
In the general coloration it is red, 
but the ears, face, throat ruff, but- 
tocks, the under-parts, and the greater 
part of the legs are black. This 
THE MANED SHEEP OF THE CAMEROONS. extensive area of black is somewhat 
The smallest Sheep in existence. An adult ram stands only nineteen remarkable ; and seems to have been 
inches high at the withers. Its black colour is remarkable, and rather derived from the extension downwards 
points to the theory that domestication has rendered protective coloration 
unnecessary, and so the more conspicuous colour has been allowed to of the black band found on the flanks 
spread. ; 
of the wild Moufflon, whose under- 
parts, for protective purposes, are white. Domestication has rendered protective coloration 
unnecessary, and thus the black has been allowed to spread without check. 
IBILANCIK, IBO)WS ANID) GIRASSSINRIBES 
Tue Black Boy here alluded to is a vegetable production, a native of Australia, like the human black 
boy. It is probable that the early British settlers in the colonies, ever on the look-out for the natives, 
constantly imagined that they saw them lurking in the bush, and found, when they were better 
acquainted with their surroundings, that what they had often taken for a “ black fellow’”’ with a 
long spear raised ready for use, was nothing more dangerous to them than a Grass Gum-tree. Apart 
from this remarkable resemblance, which has struck many modern travellers, the plant 1S 
