Placed in the Class Mammalia, and Order Ruminantia, the innumerable varieties at present existing may, according to Cuvier, whose tact in arranging animals is universally acknowledged, all be referred to four species--the Argali of Siberia, the Mouflon of Sardinia, the Mouflon of America, and the Mouflon of Africa--though to be rigidly accurate in natural distinctions he would refer them all to three, thereby excluding the third. (2.) _The Argali of Siberia_ (_Ovis Ammon_) inhabits the mountains of Asia, where it attains the size of a fallow deer. The male has very large horns, with three rounded angles at the base, flattened in front, and striated transversely. The horns of the female are compressed, and hook-shaped. The hair is short in summer, and of a fawn-coloured grey; in winter it is thick, rigid, and of a reddish grey, with some white about the muzzle, throat, and under the belly. The Mouflon of Sardinia (_Ovis Musimon_, Fig. 1. Pl. I.) differs from it only in its inferior size, and in the smallness of the horns of the female. (3.) _The Mouflon of America_ (_Ovis Montana_) closely resembles the Argali, and is supposed by some to be identical with it, and to have crossed from Asia to America at Behring's Straits by means of ice. (4.) _The Mouflon of Africa_ (_Ovis Tragelaphus_) is distinguished by its soft and reddish hair, by its short tail, and by a long mane hanging under the neck, and another at each ancle; it inhabits the rocky districts of Barbary, and has been observed in Egypt. (5.) _British Breeds._--The breeds of our island, as they at present stand, may be divided into two kinds--long-woolled and short-woolled; the former embracing the Lincolnshire, the Teeswater, the Dishley, or New Leicester, and the Devonshire Nots; while the latter will include those of Dorset, Herefordshire, and Sussex, with the Cheviot, Mugg, and Black-faced variety.[1] [1] Encyclopedia Britannica, 7th Edition, Article Agriculture. (6). _The Lincolnshire_ has no horns; the face is white; the carcass long and thin; the legs thick, white, and rough; bones large; pelts thick; and the wool from 8 to 10 inches in length. The ewes weigh from 14 lbs. to 20 lbs. per quarter; and three-year old wethers 20 lbs. to 30 lbs. The fleece weighs from 8 lbs. to 14 lbs., and covers a coarse-grained slow-feeding carcass; so slow, indeed, at feeding, that it cannot be fattened at an early age, except upon rich land; but the breed is encouraged, from the great weight of wool that is shorn from them every year. It and its sub-varieties are extremely common in the English counties.