of the meat, is equally certain, and shown in the estimation in
which those flocks are held which have grazed on the thymy heath of
Bamstead in Sussex. It is also a well-established truth, that the
_larger_ the frame of the animal, the _coarser_ is the meat, and that
_small bones_ are both guarantees for the fineness of the breed and the
delicacy of the flesh. The sex too has much to do in determining the
quality of the meat; in the males, the lean is closer in fibre, deeper
in colour, harder in texture, less juicy, and freer from fat, than in
the female, and is consequently tougher and more difficult of digestion;
but probably age, and the character of the pasturage on which they are
reared, has, more than any other cause, an influence on the quality and
tenderness of the meat.

684. THE NUMEROUS VARIETIES of sheep inhabiting the different regions of
the earth have been reduced by Cuvier to three, or at most four,
species: the _Ovis Amman_, or the Argali, the presumed parent stock of
all the rest; the _Ovis Tragelaphus_, the bearded sheep of Africa; the
_Ovis Musmon_, the Musmon of Southern Europe; and the _Ovis Montana_,
the Mouflon of America; though it is believed by many naturalists that
this last is so nearly identical with the Indian Argali as to be
undeserving a separate place. It is still a controversy to which of
these three we are indebted for the many breeds of modern domestication;
the Argali, however, by general belief, has been considered as the most
_probable_ progenitor of the present varieties.

685. THE EFFECTS PRODUCED BY CHANGE OF CLIMATE, accident, and other
causes, must have been great to accomplish so complete a physical
alteration as the primitive Argali must have undergone before the
Musmon, or Mouflon of Corsica, the _immediate_ progenitor of all our
European breeds, assumed his present appearance. The Argali is about a
fifth larger in size than the ordinary English sheep, and being a native
of a tropical clime, his fleece is of hair instead of wool, and of a
warm reddish brown, approaching to yellow; a thick mane of darker hair,
about seven inches long, commences from two long tufts at the angle of
the jaws, and, running _under_ the throat and neck, descends down the
chest, dividing, at the fore fork, into two parts, one running down the
front of each leg, as low as the shank. The horns, unlike the character
of the order generally, have a quadrangular base, and, sweeping inwards,
terminate