[242] Strabo, l. xvii. c. 1. § 3. p. 476, 477. ed. Siebenkees.
[243] Cap. 2. § 1. 3. p. 621. 626. Strabo’s account is illustrated and confirmed by the traveller, Dr. Shaw, who describes a variety of sheep in the interior of Africa with “fleeces as coarse and hairy as those of the goat.”—Travels in Barbary, part iii. chap. 2. § 1.
[244] Callixenus Rhodius, apud Athenæum, l. v. p. 201. ed. Casaub.
We find, that the people of Libya had attained to some distinction in the management of flocks. What Diodorus says of the Egyptian sheep is asserted by Aristotle of those of Libya, viz. that they produced young twice in the year[245]. That sheep-breeding had extended hither in very early times appears from a passage in the Odyssey, which, however, in consequence of the remoteness of the situation and the imperfect knowledge of geography in the time of the writer, is mixed with fable, inasmuch as it represents, that the ewes brought forth not only twice, but even three times in the year, and that the lambs were immediately provided with horns[246].
That happy clime! where each revolving year
The teeming ewes a triple offspring bear,
And two fair crescents of translucent horn
The brows of all their young increase adorn;
The shepherd swains, with sure abundance blest,
On the fat flock and rural dainties feast;