across the plains of Padan-aram to begin his experiments
upon the flocks of his uncle, Laban; and, notwithstanding the high
degree of excellence he attained as a wool-grower, and the innumerable
painstaking efforts subsequently made by individuals and associations
in all kinds of pastures and climates, we still seem to be as far from
definite and satisfactory results as we ever were. In one breed the
wool is apt to wither and crinkle like hay on a sun-beaten hillside. In
another, it is lodged and matted together like the lush tangled grass of
a manured meadow. In one the staple is deficient in length, in another
in fineness; while in all there is a constant tendency toward disease,
rendering various washings and dippings indispensable to prevent its
falling out. The problem of the quality and quantity of the carcass
seems to be as doubtful and as far removed from a satisfactory solution
as that of the wool. Desirable breeds blundered upon by long series
of groping experiments are often found to be unstable and subject to
disease--bots, foot rot, blind staggers, etc.--causing infinite trouble,
both among breeders and manufacturers. Would it not be well, therefore,
for some one to go back as far as possible and take a fresh start?

The source or sources whence the various breeds were derived is not
positively known, but there can be hardly any doubt of their being
descendants of the four or five wild species so generally distributed
throughout the mountainous portions of the globe, the marked differences
between the wild and domestic species being readily accounted for by the
known variability of the animal, and by the long series of painstaking
selection to which all its characteristics have been subjected. No other
animal seems to yield so submissively to the manipulations of culture.
Jacob controlled the color of his flocks merely by causing them to stare
at objects of the desired hue; and possibly Merinos may have caught
their wrinkles from the perplexed brows of their breeders. The
California species (Ovis montana) [2] is a noble animal, weighing when
full-grown some three hundred and fifty pounds, and is well worthy the
attention of wool-growers as a point from which to make a new departure,
for pure wildness is the one great want, both of men and of sheep.

II. A Geologist's Winter Walk [3]

After reaching Turlock, I sped afoot over the stubble fields and through
miles of brown hemizonia and purple erigeron