598 SHEEP HORNLESS WHITE-FACED SHORT-WOOLS 



in bulk by selection, was enlarged in carcase and lengthened 

 in fleece by careful and repeated crossing." The greater part 

 of this change took place between 1800 and 1828, though at 

 the latter date it was actively progressing. The old Ryeland's 

 fattening 1 record on turnips was to produce "before Lady 

 Day almost as much loose fat within them as they were 

 pounds per quarter. . . . The superabundant fat did not load 

 the muscles externally, as in the Leicester . . . and the flesh 

 was on that account more generally acceptable," more especi- 

 ally as it " developed particularly on the loins and haunches." 

 Ladylift, in the Hereford Times p , December 20, 1902, 

 ventures the theory that the name of " Ryeland " was 

 corrupted from " Rhulan," a district of Radnorshire, which at 

 one time possessed a much wider signification than it bears at 

 present. In support, he goes on to say that : 



" The sheep from which the celebrated Leominster wool 

 was shorn the ' Lemster ore,' as it is called by Drayton 

 and Camden and which are commonly supposed to be 

 identical with the Ryeland, are spoken of by celebrated 

 writers by Dyer in his Fleece, and by Philips in his Cider 

 writers who were not only poets but distinguished as 

 antiquarians as ' bred in Cambria/ which assertion is 

 corroborated by the learned annotator of the latter poem, the 

 Rev. Charles Demster . . . who goes further, and fixes the 

 part of ' Cambria/ whence they came, as the ( Radnorshire 

 Hills. 1 " 



A local writer says : " Camden, in describing the town 

 of Leominster, said : The greatest name and fame is of the 

 wool in the territories round about it, which, setting aside that 

 of Arabia and Tarentum, all Europe counteth to be the 

 verie best. Low considered it probable that it was descended 

 from the soft-woolled sheep supposed to have been in the 

 possession of the earliest Celtic inhabitants of the British 

 Islands. From time immemorial the tract of country 

 lying between the Severn and the mountains of Wales 

 carried a small, hornless breed, noted for the softness of 

 their wool. In the county of Hereford it was most frequently 

 met with; though it spread into other districts, reaching 

 Monmouthshire in the south, and Shropshire in the north 

 (where its successors have long been known as the Clun 

 Forest breed). The breed also extended eastward into 

 Gloucester and Warwick. There were many local names 

 attaching to the breed according as large numbers of them 

 were found in a particular district. Ultimately it obtained 



