BRITISH LONG-WOOLLED SHEEP. 17 



CHAPTER III. 

 BRITISH LONG-WOOLLED SHEEP. 



LEICESTERS. 



THE Long-woolled races of sheep are essentially English 

 in origin. They are represented by the Lincoln, Kent, 

 Cotswold, Leicester and Devon Long -wool breeds, but 

 especially by the three first-named races. The position of 

 the Leicester breed is particularly interesting, not so much 

 on account of the length of its wool, which indeed is short 

 in comparison with that of the other long-woolled sheep, as 

 because of its historical connection with the improvement 

 of all the other long-woolled varieties of sheep. The 

 premier place is by common consent awarded to the 

 Leicester on account of its having been the first breed upon 

 which the skill of the breeder was applied. 



The Leicester sheep appears to have inhabited Leicester- 

 shire and the neighbouring counties for a long period before 

 it was subjected to improvement. Markham, whose twelfth 

 edition of " Cheap and Good Husbandry " bears the date of 

 1668, writing of the sheep of the Midlands, says, " The sheep 

 of Worcestershire, which joineth on Warwickshire, and many 

 parts of Warwickshire, all Leicestershire, Buckinghamshire, 

 and part of Northamptonshire ; and that part of Nottingham- 

 shire which is exempt from the forest of Sherwood, beareth 

 a large-boned sheep, of the best shape, and deepest staple ; 

 chiefly they be pasture sheep, yet is their wool coarser than 

 that of Cotsal " (Cotswold). 



Professor Low also says : " There is no reason, therefore, 



