VEGETATION ADAPTED TO DIFFERENT BREEDS. 87 



production, but still the greatly higher cost of land there, 

 more than counterbalances those advantages on the score of 

 actual and direct profit to the grower. While all the mutton 

 sheep are abundant consumers, there is a difference in them in 

 this particular, and in the quality of the food they require. 

 Speaking generally, the long-wools require the richest and 

 most abundant pasturage, and they will consume ranker 

 herbage than would be adapted to upland breeds, or to the 

 Merino. They are much less inclined to travel or work for 

 their food. They are therefore, properly, low-land sheep. 

 Their place is rather the rich, moist plain, than the dry hill- 

 side. The Leicester is the tenderest and the least disposed to 

 work of all. The Cotswold is perhaps the hardiest and best 

 worker of the long-Svools which I have described, and thrives 

 on low, moist hills, like those from which it derives its name.* 

 Judging from its blood, the New Oxfordshire should occupy 

 an intermediate place between the two preceding families. 

 All the Down families are hardy and possess good working 

 qualities. In England they are regarded as an upland sheep, 

 adapted to dry and comparatively scanty pasturage when 

 necessary. But this is to be understood with qualifications, 

 in the United States. The words " upland " and " dry," as 

 applied to pasturage, have very different significations from 

 their English ones, in our land of lofty hills and mountains, 

 and of dry, scorching summers. 



As a hard working sheep as a sheep adapted to very 

 scanty, or dried up, or poor pasturage, none of the heavy 

 English mutton breeds can compare with the Merino. The 

 latter, indeed, work for their food of preference. Where 

 they have an opportunity to choose, they will invariably 

 desert the rich valley a considerable portion of each day to 

 climb the lofty hill -side, and they love to clamber about its 

 steep declivities and among rocks, to crop the scattered tufts 

 of grass, and browse on those bushes and weeds which they 

 are fond of mingling with their food. They have not, in these 

 particulars, been bred away as far from the natural habits of 

 the species as the English sheep. Their annual sojourn 

 among the mountains of Spain, until a comparatively recent 

 period, preserved these habits. 



From an observation of these facts, it has been inferred 

 that the Merino requires short verdure, and a considerable 

 variety of it. It is probable, on chemical considerations, that, 

 other things being equal, several kinds of food will furnish 



* The Cotswold Hills are iu Gloucestershire, England. 



