INTRODUCTION. 



AN attempt has been made in the following pages to give an 

 impartial history of all the most valuable varieties and families or sheep 

 in the United States, to explain the principles of breeding on which 

 their improvement rests, and to describe their proper treatment 

 in health and sickness, under the different climatic and other circum- 

 stances to which they are necessarily subjected in a country as 

 extensive as our own. 



Many of the topics of this work have been ably discussed, and are 

 constantly being ably discussed in our Agricultural periodicals ; but it 

 is now eighteen years since the publication of the last elaborate 

 American work which treats on them connectedly and with any 

 considerable degree of fullness. It is fifteen years since the appearance 

 of my own Sheep Husbandry in the South, which was confined to a 

 portion of these subjects, and, in many instances, as the title would 

 imply, to views and statements intended for local rather than general 

 information. 



In the mean tune, a great change almost an entire revolution 

 has taken place in the character of American sheep, and in the systems 

 of American sheep husbandry. The fine - wool families which existed 

 here in 1845 have, under a train of circumstances which will be found 

 recorded in this volume, mostly passed away; and they have been 

 succeeded by a new family, developed in our own country, which calls 

 for essentially different standards of breeding and modes of practical 

 treatment. 



Our improved English, or, as they are often termed, mutton breeds 

 of sheep, instead of being now confined to a few small, scattering 

 flocks, have spread into every portion of our country, represent a large 

 amount of agricultural capital, and throughout regions of considerable 

 extent are more profitable than sheep kept specially for wool growing 

 purposes. Some of the most valuable families of them were wholly 

 unknown in this country indeed, had scarcely been brought into 

 general notice in England fifteen years ago. And, finally, our 

 advanced agricultural condition has created a new set of agricultural 

 circumstances and interests which materially affect, and, in turn, are 

 materially affected by, sheep husbandry, so that their reciprocal 

 relations must be understood to lead to the highest measure of success 

 in almost any department of farming. 



In view of these facts, a new work on American Sheep Husbandry 

 brought clown to the requirements of the present day that is, 



