50 AGRICULTURE IN THE 



into the pen at once, at either washing or shearing, for fear of 

 * murthering or over pressing their fellows.' Shepherds should 

 take care to hold the sheep's head ' high enough for drowning,' 

 i. e. to prevent drowning. In shearing, too, the shepherd must 

 be very careful not to nick the skin with the edge or prick it 

 with the point of his shears. If he does, he must at once have 

 recourse to his tar-box. The sheep must be well marked : ear- 

 marked, pitch-marked, and raddle-marked. The wool must 

 be well folded or wound on a wool-winder, for the condition 

 of the wool is a great element in profitable sale. 



There is some curious information as to the breeding of sheep. 

 The time at which the ewes can be put to the rams depends on 

 the quality of the land which the husbandman possesses. If he 

 have sheep pasture for winter, and ground which supplies an 

 early growth, he need not use any rule but his own discretion. 

 If he have only common pasture, the time is ' the Exaltation of 

 the Cross (i. e. Sept. 14). If, however, he have only the com- 

 mon fields, he should wait till Michaelmas. If, lastly, he be a 

 poor husbandman in the Peak, or live in high or hilly ground, 

 without pastures and common fields, and nothing but the heath, 

 he should wait till SS. Simon and Jude's day (Oct. 38). The 

 reason is, a ewe goes twenty weeks with lamb, and yeans in 

 the twenty-first. Now if at the end of her time she have 

 no new grass, and the ewes have no milk, the lamb is lost, 

 and often the ewe as well. Fitzherbert then proceeds to tell 

 his reader how he should make a ewe love her lamb, and in 

 case she lose it, how it is possible to make her take to another, 

 whose dam is weak. Some people, he concludes, leave the 

 lamb with the ewe till she is dry. This is very well when the 

 husbandman has abundance of pasture. If he has not, the lamb 

 should be weaned at the end of the sixteenth or eighteenth 

 week. In the Peak, and in hilly countries, they wean the lamb 

 at the end of the twelfth week, and milk the ewes for five 

 or six weeks. But this practice does harm to both ewe and 

 lamb. Here, again, it is clear that the husbandman had to rely 

 on grass or hay only for winter feed. 



