t SHROPSHIRE DOWN SHEEP. 61 



conclusion, as there is good reason to consider that some 

 improved Cotswold blood has been infused." 



After giving some facts to prove that this last cross was 

 taken, Mr. Spooner continues: 



"Although after dipping once or twice into this breed, they 

 then ceased to do so, yet they have continued breeding from 

 the descendants of the cross, and thus in very many of the 

 Hampshire and Wiltshire flocks, there is still some improved 

 Cots \vold, and consequently Leicester blood.* Probably an 

 increase of wool has thus been obtained. Some say that on 

 the borders of Berkshire the Berkshire Nott was also used, 

 and others' contend, although without proof, that a dip of the 

 Leicester lias been infused. Be this as it may there is no doubt 

 that, although for some years past the Hampshire sheep have, 

 for the most part, been kept pure, yet they have been very 

 extensively crossed with other breeds before this period."f 



A ram and five ewes of this family, bred by Francis Budd, 

 Esq., of Hampshire, England, and which had been successful 

 competitors . at the Exhibition of the Royal Agricultural 

 Society, were imported in 1855 by Mr. Thomas Messenger, of 

 Clarence Hall, Great Neck, Long Island. They have received 

 first prizes from the State Agricultural Society, from the 

 American Institute, and from various other Societies ; and 

 they found a rapid sale in the South prior to the present war. 

 Mr. Messenger writes me that he finds them better suited to 

 the climate where he resides, and more hardy, than the South 

 Downs. He breeds them pure, and also crosess them with 

 Cotswolds and Leicesters, with great advantage, in his opinion, 

 to both the latter families of sheep. 



THE SHROPSHIRE DOWNS, Shropshire or Shrops, as they 

 are variously called, are thus described by Professor Wilson : 



"In our early records of sheep farming, Shropshire is 

 described as possessing a peculiar and distinct variety of sheep, 

 to which the name of 'Morfe Common' sheep was given, 

 from the locality to which the breed was principally confined. 

 * * In 1792, when the Bristol Wool Society procured 

 as much information as possible regarding sheep in England, 

 they reported as follows in reference to the Morfe Common 

 breed : ' On Morfe Common, near Bridgenorth, which con- 

 tains about 600,000 acres, there are about 10,000 sheep kept 



* In a note Mr. Spooner here states that it is "generally acknowledged that the 

 Cotswold sheep have been improved by crosses from the Leicester ram." 

 t Journal of Royal Agricultural Society, Vol. 20, page 302. 



