MODERN FARRIER. 455 



to stand steady, and a sufficient number for the 

 quantity of sheep be always in readiness. 



Steamed or baked potatoes, cheap convenient 

 contrivances for the preparation of which have been 

 lately invented, have been supposed by some to be 

 preferable to turnips as a food in this intention. 

 They have been employed raw in the proportion of 

 eight or ten pounds per sheep in the course of the 

 day or night ; but they are certainly a much better 

 food in their prepared state. The quantity of com- 

 mon turnips consumed by each sheep in the same 

 length of time, is usually about eighteen or twenty 

 pounds. Where this last sort of crop is good, an 

 acre is supposed to support about five score sheep in 

 the field, six or seven weeks in the winter season ; 

 an acre of good grass supporting at the rate of one 

 hundred couples from five days to a week. 



In the fattening of wedders, the use of barley 

 meal, with grass or some other sort of green food, 

 has likewise been found highly beneficial, and when 

 it can be procured at a reasonable rate, should not 

 be neglected, as it is quick in rendering them fat, 

 and the mutton is excellent. Different other arti- 

 cles are occasionally made use of as the fattening 

 food of sheep, such as peas and beans, or pea and 

 bean meal in the winter season, and some substances 

 of other kinds. In the sheep-fattening system, it is 

 often of advantage to have a portion of land, of a 

 superior rich quality, for the purpose of finishing 

 them out upon. 



The profits will materially depend on the propor- 

 tion, the richness, and the quality of the farmer's 

 fattening to his other lands, on the judgment which 

 he possesses in the buying in lean stock, the nature 

 of the season, the state of the markets, the losses 

 sustained, the expences of the management, &c. 



