THE BLACKFACED BEEED OF SHEEP. 211 



increasing in number is well indicated by the fact, that the 

 demand has been gradually becoming more active for many 

 years. This fact has not been so forcibly demonstrated within 

 the past few years, but from 1850 to 1876 there was a very 

 remarkable improvement in the character of the tup market. 

 The increased fastidiousness of flockowners in selecting high- 

 bred tups has been the means of bringing large prices into the 

 hands of a few of the most enterprising and successful sheep 

 breeders. The demand has been pressing for tups extracted 

 from some of the Hocks which I have previously mentioned, and 

 tlie owners of these may be said to have enjoyed a monopoly of 

 the trade. The rise in the prices of high-class stock within 

 the past twenty-five years has been remarkable, and affords 

 additional evidence of the desire now extant to produce an 

 altogether finer race of sheep. Tups which were worth about 

 £7 each twenty-five years ago — and £7 was considered a good 

 price — would now bring from £60 to £70, while £20 each is 

 not considered a very high price for well-bred rams. For ewe 

 stock the demand has been less active, and consec[uently the 

 advancement in prices of ewe stock has been less marked. 

 Some thirty years ago, however, 25s. was regarded as a more 

 extravagant price for a ewe lamb than 50s. or 60s. would be at 

 the present day. 



The great advancement thus indicated in the prices of black- 

 fdced sheep has not entirely resulted from one cause. There 

 have been several agents working with combined force in 

 bringing it about. An important one of these agents has 

 undoubtedly been the prevailing anxiety to improve the 

 character of the blackfaced breed, whose natural character- 

 istics are so well calculated to resist the hardships of a severe 

 climate. This anxiety has long existed among a few Hock- 

 owners, but it has been gaining a hold upon the majority in 

 recent years, and extending rapidly. The causes for this are not 

 far to seek or ill to find. The revolutionary tendency of the 

 wool market, and the meteorological severity of the past eight or 

 ten years, have turned the attention of many admirers of finer 

 svoolled breeds to the blackface. In all industries the branches 

 expected to yield most profit are generally pursued, and it is 

 believed, if indeed not actually proved, that considering the 

 scanty fare on which this breed subsists, and even thrives, 

 Iligldand Hocks are on the whole most profitable. What proves 

 an obstacle to the development of pastoral pursuits in Scothind, 

 however, is the large extent of deer forests. Fashion is the all- 

 powerful agent which has been at the bottom of the mania for 

 creating and extending these. It was estimated in 1S7."> that 

 the number of sheep displaced by forests in Scothind was 

 400,000, while it has been computed that since then the 



