CROSS-BREEDING. 199 



the prepotency of several English breeds, M. Malin- 

 gie-Nouel says : " If you put a Leicester ram, a 'mixed 

 New Kent, 1 or a Southdown that is not pure, to a 

 pure ewe of any French race, very little English char- 

 acter is impressed on the offspring, never less than 

 when the ewe is a pure merino. In this last case, it 

 often happens that you can see no difference between 

 lambs that are Leicester-merinos, Kent-merinos, or 

 Southdown-merinos, and another lamb of the same 

 age which is pure merino. In compensation, how- 

 ever, for this feeble influence of the English sire, the 

 lambs of such first crosses have no more difficulty 

 than French lambs in getting over the first summer. 

 If, on the contrary, the same ewes are put to very 

 pure rams of the Southdown or New' Kent breed, 

 the English character is more marked than in the 

 former cases. 



" In both cases the offspring is reared ; for lambs 

 in which the English blood does not exceed one-half 

 seem to be reared as easily as pure French lambs. 

 But, then, since little improvement is obtained, one is 

 tempted to give a new dose of English blood to put 

 the Anglo-French ewes to English rams whereupon 

 the disasters described are sure to follow." 8 



After discussing the causes of the state of facts 

 above referred to, M. Malingie-Nouel proceeds as fol- 



1 The New Kent breed was established by Richard Goord, from 

 " nine ewes and one ram " of the Romney Marsh breed, and a few 

 rams obtained of Mr. Wall. They were deeply in-bred, and like the 

 Southdowns were improved without crossing (Journal of the Royal 

 Agricultural Society, vol. vi., p. 263). 



8 Loc, cit., pp. 217, 218. 



