NATURAL HISTORY. 



835 



confide the care of the sheep to the 

 management of their shepherds, 

 without admitting any interference 

 on the part of the proprietor, no 

 profit of the flock comes to the 

 hands of the owner, except what is 

 derived from the wool ; the car- 

 cases of the culled sheep are con- 

 sumed by the shepherds, and it does 

 not appear that any account is ren- 

 dered by them to their employers, 

 of the value of the skins, the tal- 

 low, &c. ; the profit derived by a 

 proprietor from a flock, is estimat- 

 ed on an average at about one shil- 

 ling a-head, and the produce of a 

 capital vested in a flock is said to 

 fluctuate between five and ten per 

 cent. 



The sheep are always low kept. 

 It is the business of each Mayoral, 

 to increase his flock to as large a 

 number as the land allotted to it 

 can possibly maintain ; when it is 

 arrived at that pitch, all further in- 

 crease is useless, as there is no sale 

 for these sheep, unless some neigh- 

 bouring flock has been reduced by 

 mortality, below its proper number; 

 the most of the lambs are therefore 

 every year killed as soon as they 

 are yeaned, and each of those pre- 

 served is made to suck two or three 

 ewes. The shepherds say, that the 

 wool of an ewe, that brings up her 

 lambs without assistance, is re- 

 duced in its value. 



At shearing time the shepherds, 

 shearers, washers, and a multitude of 

 unnecessary attendants.arefed upon 

 the flesh of the culled sheep ; and it 

 seems that the consumption occa- 

 sioned by this season of feasting is 

 sufficient to devour the whole of 

 the sheep that are draughted from 

 the flock. Mutton in Spain is not 

 a favourite food ; in truth, it is 

 not in that country prepared for 



the palate as it is in this ; we have 

 our lamb-fairs, our hog-fairs, our 

 shearling-fairs, our fairs for culls, 

 and our markets for fat sheep, 

 where the mutton, having passed 

 through these different stages of 

 preparation, each under the care of 

 men, whose soil and whose skill is 

 best suited to the part they have 

 been taught by their interest to 

 assign to themselves, is offered for 

 sale, and if fat and good, it seldom 

 fails to command a price by the 

 pound, from 5 to ten per cent 

 dearer than that of beef. In Spain, 

 they have no such sheep-fairs cal- 

 culated to subdivide the education 

 of each animal, by making it pass 

 through many hands, as works of 

 art do in a manufacturing concern, 

 and they have not any fat sheep 

 markets that at all resemble ours ; 

 the low state of grazing of Spain 

 ought not therefore to be wondered 

 at, nor the poverty of the Spanish 

 farmers ; they till a soil sufficiently 

 productive by nature, but are rob- 

 bed of the reward due to the 

 occupier, by the want of an advan- 

 tageous market for their produce, 

 and the benefit of an extensive 

 consumption ; till the manufactur- 

 ing and mercantile parts of a com- 

 munity become opulent enough to 

 pay liberal prices, the agricultural 

 part of it cannot grow rich by 

 selling. 



That the sole purpose of the 

 journeys taken annually by these 

 sheep, is to seek food in places 

 where it can be found, and that 

 these migrations would not be un- 

 dertaken, if either in the northen or 

 the southern provinces, a sufficiency 

 of good pasture could be obtained 

 during the whole year, appears a 

 matter of certainty. That change 

 of pasture has no effect upon their 



3 H 2 wool, 



