Turning now to domesticated animals, we find that certain characters not
proper to the parent species are often confined to, and inherited by, one sex
alone; but we do not know the history of the first appearance of such
characters. In the chapter on Sheep, we have seen that the males of certain
races differ greatly from the females in the shape of their horns, these being
absent in the ewes of some breeds; they differ also in the development of fat
in the tail and in the outline of the forehead. These differences, judging
from the character of the allied wild species, cannot be accounted for by
supposing that they have been derived from distinct parent forms. There is,
also, a great difference between the horns of the two sexes in one Indian
breed of goats. The bull zebu is said to have a larger hump than the cow. In
the Scotch deer-hound the two sexes differ in size more than in any other
variety of the dog (14/28. W. Scrope 'Art of Deer Stalking' page 354.) and,
judging from analogy, more than in the aboriginal parent-species. The peculiar
colour called tortoise-shell is very rarely seen in a male cat; the males of
this variety being of a rusty tint.
In various breeds of the fowl the males and females often differ greatly; and
these differences are far from being the same with those which distinguish the
two sexes of the parent-species, the Gallus bankiva; and consequently have
originated under domestication. In certain sub-varieties of the Game race we
have the unusual case of the hens differing from each other more than the
cocks. In an Indian breed of a white colour shaded with black, the hens
invariably have black skins, and their bones are covered by a black
periosteum, whilst the cocks are never or most rarely thus characterised.
Pigeons offer a more interesting case; for throughout the whole great family
the two sexes do not often differ much; and the males and females of the
parent-form, the C. livia, are undistinguishable: yet we have seen that with
pouters the male has the characteristic quality of pouting more strongly
developed than the female; and in certain sub-varieties the males alone are
spotted or striated with black, or otherwise differ in colour. When male and
female English carrier-pigeons are exhibited in separate pens, the difference
in the development of the wattle over the beak and round the eyes is
conspicuous. So that here we have instances of the appearance of secondary
sexual characters in the domesticated races of a species in which such
differences are naturally quite absent.]
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