This breed consists of numerous sub-varieties, differing in all their characteristics of size, fleece, color, &c., with quite as many and marked shades of distinction as the modern European varieties. In Madagascar, they are covered with hair; in the south of Africa, with coarse wool; in the Levant, and along the Mediterranean, the wool is comparatively fine; and from that of the fat-rumped sheep of Thibet the exquisite Cashmere shawls are manufactured. Both rams and ewes are sometimes bred with horns, and sometimes without, and they exhibit a great diversity of color. Some yield a carcass of scarcely 30 lbs., while others have weighed 200 lbs. dressed. The tail or rump varies greatly, according to the purity and style of breeding; some are less than one-eighth, while others exceed one-third the entire dressed weight. The fat of the rump or tail is considered a great delicacy, and in hot climates resembles oil, and in colder, suet. The broad-tailed sheep were brought into this country, about 50 years since, by Commodore Barron and Judge Peters, and bred with the native flocks. They were called the Tunisian mountain sheep. Some of them were subsequently distributed by Col. Pickering, of Massachusetts, among the farmers of Pennsylvania; and their mixed descendants were highly prized as prolific and good nurses, coming early to maturity, attaining large weights, of a superior quality of carcass, and yielding a heavy fleece of excellent wool. The principal objection brought against them, was the difficulty of propagation, which always required the assistance of the shepherd. The lambs were dropped white, red, tawny, bluish, or black; but all excepting the black, grew white as they approached maturity, retaining some spots of the original color on the cheeks and legs, and sometimes having the entire head tawny or black. The few which descended from those originally imported into this country, have become blended with American flocks, and are now scarcely distinguishable from them. Native or Common Sheep of the United States. Strictly speaking, there are no sheep indigenous to North America, excepting the _Ovis Montana_, or Rocky Mountain sheep. Before the introduction of the improved European breeds, during the present century, our sheep were generally a hardy, long-legged, coarse, open-fleeced animal, which yielded, according to attention and feed, from 1½ to 4 lbs. of indifferent wool. We have seen numerous flocks within the last 20 years, of the pure-bred native, whose bellies were entirely destitute of wool, and sometimes the whole carcass was bare, excepting a mere strip or ridge like a mane, reaching from the head to the tail. The wool which was retained on the neck, back, and sides, was frequently matted almost as firmly as a leather apron; and that on the thighs, and sometimes on the sides, was often composed almost wholly of long hair.