LECTURES AND ESSAYS READ AT INSTITUTES. 151 



The Champion plate and the Clnb's gold medal were awarded to Hampshire 

 Downs bred by William Parsons (for the best of any breed), for a pen of three 

 wethers nine months and tivo weeTcs old, which weighed 643 pounds or two 

 liundred and fourteen 'pounds each. 



Of nineteen entries of cross-bred sheep, seventeen were crosses of Hampshire 

 Downs. 



At the Norwich, (England), show the first premium was given to a pen of 

 lambs, first cross of Hampshire and Cotswold, at Birmingham, England, to 

 South Downs. What is the future with the Michigan farmers in regard to 

 sheep husbandry? The reduction of the tariff on wool made last winter has, 

 it would seem, alarmed a great number of sheep breeders and wool growers. 

 I am not of the number. I am making my arrangements, and hope in 1886 

 to own and carry on my farm 1,000 or more sheep. 



It is true that wool is nearly the only product of our Michigan farmers 

 which receives any of the benefits so lavishly and bountifully bestowed by the 

 government by means of a protective tariff upon favored classes. 



My conclusion is that we must rely upon our natural advantages and try to 

 adapt ourselves to the circumstances which surround us and raise that which the 

 market demands. 



The great west is filling up with sheep and they can raise wool on lands 

 which cost the flock masters little or nothing, and with immense amounts of 

 foreign capital, just as cheap as it can be done any cohere else in the world. 



Let us who are near to market give our attention to mutton as much as we 

 do to wool. If the tenant farmers of England can keep, as they do, three 

 sheep to every four acres, and raise mutton and wool in competition with the 

 whole world, and pay from ten to twenty dollars an acre for whole farms and 

 keep up all the improvements, I will try to do it upon my farm when I only 

 expect half as much for the use of my lands. I know there is a very common 

 prejudice among farmers to the use of mutton. I fear that much of that 

 ■which is called mutton is of the kind that I heard a man who had followed 

 threshing describe. He said a farmer, late in the afternoon, would come to 

 where they were threshing and inquire if they would be at his house for sup- 

 per. If answered in the affirmative he would rush home, and with the help of 

 the boys and dog, chase down a sheep, kill it, and have it for supper. This, 

 brother farmers, is not mutton, it may be sheep. Mutton made from a well 

 fatted and carefully handled sheep is as desirable meat as can be brought to 

 our tables. There is now, and always will be, a demand for good mutton at 

 good prices. Breed your sheep for good mutton and desirable wool and both 

 will bring fair prices and be as little liable to fluctuate in value as any of the 

 products of our farms. 



In 1883 my flock produced about 1,500 pounds of wool, 70 per cent of this 

 brought 43 cents, and 30 per cent 38 cents in Boston market. I sold it and 

 received 35 cents for the whole lot at home ; while my fine wool ram's fleeces, 

 of VZ to 14 pounds, brought 16 to 20 cents in Boston, I was paid for it at home 

 20 cents. The time when grease will Iring the 'price of wool has passed away. 



