STEEP TRAILS 



for the uses of nature as a meadowlark killed 

 and plucked and roasted. Give to Nature every 

 cultured apple codling, pippin, russet and 

 every sheep so laboriously compounded 

 muffled Southdowns, hairy Cotswolds, wrin 

 kled Merinos and she would throw the one 

 to her caterpillars, the other to her wolves. 



It is now some thirty-six hundred years 

 since Jacob kissed his mother and set out 

 across the plains of Padan-aram to begin his ex 

 periments upon the flocks of his uncle, Laban; 

 and, notwithstanding the high degree of excel 

 lence he attained as a wool-grower, and the 

 innumerable painstaking efforts subsequently 

 made by individuals and associations in all 

 kinds of pastures and climates, we still seem 

 to be as far from definite and satisfactory re 

 sults as we ever were. In one breed the wool 

 is apt to wither and crinkle like hay on a sun- 

 beaten hillside. In another, it is lodged and 

 matted together like the lush tangled grass of 

 a manured meadow. In one the staple is defi 

 cient in length, in another in fineness; while in 

 all there is a constant tendency toward disease, 

 rendering various washings and dippings indis 

 pensable to prevent its falling out. The prob 

 lem of the quality and quantity of the carcass 

 seems to be as doubtful and as far removed 

 from a satisfactory solution as that of the wool. 



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