FINE WOOL SHEEP HUSBANDRY. 



Varieties and Sub-varieties in Spain. 



The first division recognized in Spain was into 

 Transhumantes or travelling flocks, and Estantes or 

 stationary flocks. The first were regarded as the 

 most valuable. They were mostly owned by the 

 King, and some of the principal nobles and clergy, 

 who, at an early period, fastened on the kingdom a 

 code of regulations which sacrificed every other agri- 

 cultural interest for the convenience of the proprie- 

 tors of these sheep.* 



The system of Spanish sheep husbandry is a curious 

 and not uninstructive leaf from the records of the 



* These will be found described in detail by Lasteyrie, Livingston, 

 and other writers. The sheep were driven from the southern prov- 

 inces in April or May, according to the weather, to the mountains in 

 the north of Spain, a distance bout four hundred miles, and driven 

 back again in the autumn, generally leaving the mountains towards 

 the close of September and through the month of October. The 

 Tribunal (Consejo de la Mesta) which both made and administered 

 the laws which regulated their transit, was composed of the rich and 

 powerful flock-masters. The following remarks are from Lasteyrie's 

 most valuable Treatise on Merino Sheep : 



"A Spanish writer, Jorvellanes, in a memoir addressed to the 

 King of Spain, pays 'the corps of Junadines (proprietors of flocks) 

 enjoy an enormous power, and have, by the force of sophisms and 

 intrigues, not only engrossed all the pastures of the kingdom, but 

 have made the cultivators abandon their most fertile lands ; thus they 

 have banished the stationary flocks, ruined agriculture, and depopu- 

 lated the country.' It is easily conceived that five millions of sheep 

 traversing the kingdom in almost its whole extent, for whom the 

 cultivators are compelled to leave a road through their vineyards 

 and best cultivated lands, of not less than ninety yards wide, and 

 for whom, besides, large commons must be left; I say, it is easily 

 conceived that such a flock must greatly contribute to the depopula- 

 tion of the country, and that the revenue that the King draws 

 by the duty on wool, is snatched from the bread of his people." 



