130 THE SHEPHERD'S MANUAL. 



Kosternitz, in Pomerania. Its wool was 3 inches in length, very 

 thick upon the skin, very equal in quality, of fair strength, and 

 covered the legs and ears. The sire of this ram clipped 27 Ibs. of 

 unwashed wool, which, when washed in hot water, yielded 17 Ibs. 

 of clean wool. Ferdinand Schwartz, of Lappenhagen, exhibited 

 a French, (Rambouillet), Merino ram, whose fleece weighed, un- 

 washed, 31 Ibs., equal to 15 Ibs. of washed wool. This animal 

 had three neck-folds, but no "rose" or rump fold. His wool was 

 2f inches long, and thickly set upon the skin. 



Prince Schaumberg-Lippe, of Post Stalitz, Bohemia, exhibited 

 some combing or delaine wool Merinos, of French blood, whose 

 fleeces were of the extraordinary length of 5 to 7 inches. The 

 yield of the whole flock, of more than 800, is said to average 14 

 Ibs. per head of unwashed wool, which shrank in scouring in the 

 factory, 58 per cent. It is impossible to consider the excellent 

 points and intrinsic merits of the well bred French Merino, and its 

 poor success, so far, in this country, without being forcibly remind- 

 ed of the lack of wisdom of a course frequently and periodically 

 pursued by American breeders and farmers, and nowhere more 

 strikingly shown than in the past experience of our sheep husbandry 

 with its sudden and excessive vicissitudes. The ' * ups and downs " 

 of this industry, every few years, is one of the strangest manifesta- 

 tions of unsteadiness ever recorded in any pursuit It is unfortu- 

 nate for us that we can hardly restrain ourselves from over san- 

 guine expectations on the one hand, or on the other hand, when 

 results do not meet our anticipations, from the utmost depression. 

 Being too ready to form opinions, and to act in obedience rather 

 to our sudden impressions than to our mature judgments, we enter 

 into new enterprises without consideration, and abandon them in 

 a panic. Thus a thing excellent in itself, and of inherent value 

 to us, is extolled to the skies without justice at the outset, and 

 then with equal want of justice, is condemned and sacrificed as 

 utterly valueless, because it has failed to turn all it touched into 

 gold. This is the history of all our agricultural manias. And the 

 French Merino has been made the subject of just such exalted ex- 

 pectations, and of just such deep denunciations. Yet there is a 

 place for this breed in our agriculture which it will hold and keep 

 at some period in the future in spite of past adverse experiences. 



THE SAXON MEBINO. In 1765 the King of Spain, on the appli- 

 cation of his brother-in-law, Prince Xavier, sent 300 Merinos of 

 the Escurial family into Saxony. These sheep, naturally the finest 

 wooled and the least hardy of the Spanish flocks, were so bred as 

 to still further increase the fineness of the fleece, and to diminish 



