CHAPTER YIII. 



BORDER LEICESTERS. 



By JOHN USHEE, Stodrig, Kelso. 



N tracing the origin of the breed of sheep now 

 commonly called Border Leicesters, it seems almost 

 a work of supererogation to prove that they are 

 descended from a flock known as the Bakewell or 

 Dishley breed, and the more directly their lineage can be traced 

 to that flock, and their exemption from the introduction of any 

 other strain proved, the more they are generally allowed to be 

 distinguished by symmetry of frame and purity of blood. The 

 breed owed its existence to Mr. Robert Bakewell, of Dishley, in 

 Leicestershire ; by a course of systematic experiments, com- 

 menced about the year 1755, in crossing the old Leicesters — 

 said to have been " large coarse animals, with an abundance of 

 fleece, and a fair disposition to fatten " — with other long- 

 woolled breeds, probably possessing smaller frames and more 

 symmetrica] proportions, he in the course of years worked them 

 into a new breed. As the breeds he used, and the proportions 

 in which he used them, are conjectural (his system having been 

 carried on with much mystery), it seems vain to attempt to 

 enumerate them. Bakewell must have had a good knowledge 

 of animal physiology, and as his aim appears to have been, not 

 so much to produce sheep of large size as of fine frame, and 

 great aptitude to fatten, it is probable that he connected 

 together animals of the purest blood, nearly allied to one 

 another, thus producing sires which, in their turn, exerted a 

 preponderating influence on their progeny. That he ultimately 

 succeeded in establishing a distinct breed — their distinguishing 



