230 FITTING SHEEP 



to that from the poorly finished ones; the flesh of the latter 

 being too often tough, stringy, and almost tasteless. 



It is not my wish or intention to criticise, but I do think,, 

 and the block test has proved it to be so time and again, 

 that the judges sometimes selected to pass on the exhibits 

 at the fat stock shows are sometimes working out of their 

 latitude, their decision being given too often from a purely 

 breeder's or fancier's standpoint. Some years ago while 

 looking over the winning pens of yearling wethers at a lead- 

 ing fat stock show I was asked my opinion of a pen that had 

 been awarded champion honor's. I expressed myself that 

 so far as the weight of the animals was considered no- 

 doubt the judges were right, but if they considered those 

 the kind of animals that would make the butcher money 

 they had without a possible shadow of doubt sadly erred in 

 their judgment. They handled, to my mind, exceedingly 

 blubbery and the "tokens" plainly convinced me that they 

 were so sadly lacking in flesh as to be of very little use 

 to the butcher. My surmises were amply verified by the 

 block test. They proved to be enveloped in a thick mantle 

 of useless "spine" fat that along the loins was not much 

 less than one and a half inches in thickness, while the flesh 

 of the loin was exceedingly poor, that streak of flesh which 

 is in evidence in the loin of mutton from sheep of really 

 good quality being almost entirely absent. How can a 

 butcher possibly make a profit out of such animals? Where 

 is our judgment when we award premiums to animals so 

 poor in flesh and carrying such a superfluity of fat, over 

 those carrying- wealth of flesh and teeming with other de- 

 sirable qualities? 



I cannot, perhaps, better illustrate the idea I wish to con- 



