SKETCH OF MODERN AGRICULTURE 83 



Philadelphia in 1788, and the great Justin Morgan, the sire 

 of the Morgan breed, was foaled in 1789. These were the 

 beginnings of special types which might, without serious mis- 

 representation, be called American breeds. With these possible 

 exceptions the United States has produced no distinctive 

 breeds of the larger farm animals. Several varieties of pigs 

 and poultry have been produced, and what might be called a 

 special breed of the Merino sheep. 



Sheep. One of the most interesting chapters in the history 

 of American husbandry relates to the general introduction of 

 the Merino sheep. The first animals of this breed were imported 

 in 1773, but the industry was not yet in a flourishing con- 

 dition. With the restrictions upon trade growing out of the 

 Napoleonic disturbances in Europe, there grew up a necessity 

 for a domestic supply of wool. At the same time the Pen- 

 insular War created such conditions in Spain that the herds 

 of Merinos, which up to that time had been guarded as a 

 quasi-national monopoly, were broken up and offered for sale. 

 Enterprising American farmers began buying them, and by 

 1809 there were said to be 5000 in the country. The price 

 of Merino wool soared, and the prices of sheep soared still 

 higher. There grew up a speculative craze in Merinos, 1 and 

 some fabulous prices were paid. 



Hogs and the pork-packing industry. Hogs have always been 

 an important agricultural product in the United States. The 

 earliest settlers in all the colonies had found hogs very adaptable, 

 multiplying rapidly and flourishing on the food found in the 

 forest. The forests of the Ohio valley were especially rich in 

 oak and beech mast, and hogs spread and flourished even more 

 remarkably than they had east of the mountains. Every frontier 

 sett lement was thus provided with an abundant source of animal 



1 See C. W. Wright, " Wool Growing and the Tariff," Harvard Economic 

 Studies (Boston, 1910), Vol. V. 



