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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



a shepherd's boy once expressed il, " they sheep '11 get fat upon 

 nuffin in no time," and last, but not least, a valuable fleece. 

 Prolificacy in offspring may also be considered as a very essen- 

 tial quality in a breed of sheep. The Southdown breed is, 

 perhaps, on the whole the most important in England : it still 

 retains its pre-eminence, and most of the modern breeds are 

 founded on EUmau'a. Mr. J. Webb, who may justly be re- 

 garded as the Coryphoeus of breeders, possesses a flock of pure 

 Southdowus.and their qualities have surpassed others so much 

 as to raise a doubt in the mind of an eminent agriculturist at 

 the Smithfield show, whether there was not in them some mix- 

 ture of the Leicester blood. Mr. Webb, however, gave a 

 positive assurance that Jus breed had always been preserved 

 perfectly pure. The Leicester or Dishley breed, rendered fa- 

 mous by Bakewell, is the next in importance, and it is very 

 gratifying to me to be able to quote from professor Spooner the 

 following sentence, which speaks as much for " in-breeding" 

 as it does for the Leicester flock. He says, " While there is 

 no breed of long wools but what has obtained some improve- 

 ment from a cross with it, the Leicester, as regards its peculiar 

 qualities, has derived no advantage from a cross with others ; 

 but its unrivalled qualifications can only be retained by pre- 

 serving the breed pure and unstained.'' Mr. Spooner statCg 

 that a cross of Leicester with Southdowns is sometimes expe- 

 dient as being "more saleable than the pure Leicesters, and 

 with au earlier maturity and superior feeding qualities to the 

 pure Down." But, he strongly recommends that when such a 

 cross is adopted for the market, " to stop at the first cross and 

 devote the produce entirely to the butcher, not to breed from 

 them, but to preserve the stoc^ sherp pure." The purest 

 stock of Leicester sheep, and certainly the most famous ex- 

 ample of " in-and-in-breeding" of any flock whatever, is that 

 of Mr. Valentiue Barford, of Foscote, in Northamptonshire. 

 In a communication with which he has favoured me, he states 

 that his flock has been bred since the year 1789 on the in- 

 and-in system " from the nearest affinities, and has not expe 

 rienced any of those ill effects frequently ascribed to the prac- 

 tice." Indeed, I may as well state my conviction once for all, 

 that debility, leanness, lameness, " giddy," " sturdy," and other 

 bogies which sit heavy upon the bucolic mind, are not so much 

 due to inand-in breeding, as to an improper selection of pa- 

 rents in the first instance, and afterwards crossing heteroge- 

 neous animals J the blood has not properly assimilated, and 

 disease has been the result ; but if, on the other hand, healthy 

 animals of a good breed be selected, there will be no fear of 

 giddy and sturdy. There is a prevalent notion that in-breed- 

 ing produces degeneracy, disease, and idiotcy. This is only the 

 result of in-breeding from mongrels, or cross-bred animals, 

 which can only be kept in a passable condition by crossing. 

 When a cross has once been adopted you can only guard 

 against something monstrous by great discrimination and tact 

 in the selection of parents ; you will, however, have no diflicnlty 

 ia perpetuating good stock if you stick to the pure breeds or 

 races ; affinity or relationship will then be of little moment. 

 The union of what Horace Wajpole called "Nobody's son 

 with everybody's daughter," is not a satisfactory basis on 

 which to found the supply of sheep for a great mutton- 

 eating nation. Everything depends upon a proper selec- 

 tion in the first instance, and if " improvement" be wished 

 for, seek to improve by commingling animals of the same heed 

 until perfection be reached, and I need not say that perfection 

 cannot be " improvd." Sheep, as well as human beings, have 

 hereditary tendencies to disease, and all sickly or strumous 

 sheep ought to be eliminated from the breeding flock. The 

 "giddy" in sheep depends upon an encysted watery tumour in 

 the brain ; it has often been considered analogous to idiotcy 



and insanity in the human subject, but nothing can be wider 

 of the mark, and no one, unless hopelessly ignorant, would 

 make such a comparison. " Giddy" in sheep is the result of a 

 palpable structural disease. Idiotcy is congenital deficiency, 

 and an anatomist would be much pnzzled to point out any 

 disease existing in the brain of au idiot ; he might remark on 

 'ts smallness or misshapen character, but would not place his 

 finger on a tumour. A sheep with " giddy" dies of starvation, 

 pines away. An idiot will eat, sleep, and get fat. Yet the 

 "giddy'' has been attributed to the "in-and-in-breeding." 

 Nothing can be farther from the truth. Whilst on this sub- 

 ject I may remark that the size aud shape of an animal's head 

 — what a paper might be written on Animal Phrenology ! — is 

 a matter of the first importance. A quality of the greatea* 

 value in an animal is composure of mind ; an animal with a 

 narrow contracted or malformed head will be timid and 

 frightened at everything it sees or hears, and will not thrive. 

 Serenity of mind and obesity of body stand in near relation to 

 each other ; they act nnd react on each other, and they have 

 conspired to make Leicester sheep and short-horned cattle 

 marvels of laziness. It is equally difficult to provoke them to 

 love or war. Neither Venus nor Mars will arouse them into 

 activity. A sheep should have a short capacious well-domed 

 head, with an animated countenance, symmetrical face, 

 and the general contour which makes intelligence, so far 

 as that requisite can exist in a sheep. I have already 

 stated what parts of the framework of the animal are fur- 

 nished by the mother and what by the father ; there- 

 fore in making a selection of males and females for 

 breeding purposes, it will not be difticult to approximate 

 very nearly to perfection, if not actually to reach it. And 

 here, sir, iu concluding these few remarks which I have had 

 the honour to bring before this Society, allov/ me to express 

 my sincere regret for the truly insufficient and incomplete 

 manner in which I have struggled through my task ; and now 

 permit me to trust that this paper, which was begnn with dif- 

 fidence, pursued with somewhat like a feeling of despondency, 

 and now concluded— would that I could say, completed ! 

 with the faint hope that round it, as round a rude and foreign 

 nucleus, the finer particles, your well-proportioned thoughts and 

 accurately-developed opinions, may collect and crystallize— 

 will be treated leniently by those here present, who are far 

 more competent to discuss so vast and extensive a subject ; a 

 subject which, like the sky-crowned pinnacle of the loftiest 

 Himalaya, looks down and frowns upon the futile attempts of 

 prying man to scale and explore its summit; a subject which, 

 though it may aflTord to the man of accomplished mind and of 

 vast conception ample scope for backing his experience, and 

 confirming his observations by the thunders of a persuasive 

 eloquence, or illuminating bis theories by the lightning flashes 

 of a brilliant imagination, is yet a wild prarie fraught with 

 difliculties, and teeming with despair to one but of meagre 

 conception, and of very ordinary observation. 



" Si quid novisti rectiusistis 

 Candidus imperti" (loud applause). 



And now, Mr. Vice- Chairman, while time has obliged me to 

 hasten from this subject, on which I would williogly have lin- 

 gered, I rejoice in being able to refer you for its full de- 

 velopment to the deeds and words of one whose oral teachings 

 and the instructions of whose matured authority we all could 

 but faintly though gratefully acknoivledge. I refer you to 

 one whom iu the councils of our society and in the foremost 

 race of English agriculture is recognised conspicuous by learn- 

 ing, by dignity, by wisdom, by courtesy, by eloquence, and 

 whose almost universal fame and acquirements forbid our 



