CHAPTEE XXIV. 



THE RADNOR SHEEP. 



By MOEaAN EVANS. 



OME of the oldest remaining indigenous breeds of 

 sheep in our island are characterised by black faces. 

 A remnant of one of these is found in the county 

 of Eadnor, on the hills of Brecon, and scattered 

 along the western parts of Montgomery and Merioneth. The 

 original Shropshires on the Long Mynd and Morfe common 

 were black or speckled-faced, horned sheep, and were doubtless 

 allied to those of a like character in the adjoining counties of 

 Wales, and probably had one common origin. The most 

 important class of native dark-faced sheep in Wales at the pre- 

 sent time are the Radnors — a hardy, active race, that under 

 improved management have developed into a breed of fair 

 size, carrying a good weight of fleece, whilst at the same time 

 in outward form and hardihood of constitution retaining much 

 of the primitive type of wild mountain sheep. 



Having treated of Welsh mountain sheep elsewhere in this 

 volume, and the way they are usually managed, there is little 

 to be added in describing the more purely local breed of 

 Eadnors. The best kind of Radnors are those having black 

 faces, but a large number are of a tan, grimy, or grey colour, 

 and others, though of questionable purity, have faces partly 

 white. The rams are horned, and the ewes should be hornless 

 — a sexual variation thought by some high authorities to be 

 almost always the result of breeding and domestication. 

 Eadnor and other Welsh mountain ewes frequently show a 

 tendency to produce horns ; but such excrescences are not culti- 



