DISEASES OP SHEEP. 177 



me, that the superfine broadcloths made from my wool handled softer 

 than did those from the best imported Spanish wool he could pur- 

 chase; where," adds he, and there need be no better judge, "the 

 merino has been bred with attention and care, the wool has not dete- 

 riorated in any other country except England, and the deterioration 

 there has undoubtedly been owing to the uncommon humidity of the 

 climate." Here, then, is evidence sufficient to satisfy the most 

 skeptical on the point of adaptation of climate and food to the pro- 

 duction of the finest wool, where circumstances invite the farmer to 

 choose his breed with an eye to the manufacturer as his customer; 

 and the testimony of Mr. Jarvis goes further to prove that if England 

 owes the superiority of her turnip crop for coarse-woolled sheep to 

 the moisture of her climate, for the same reason she can never supply 

 her own manufacturers with fine wool. 



It is not deemed necessary to give the history of the introduction 

 of the merino into the United States, further than to state that the 

 first, a buck and two ewes from the Rambouellet flock in France, 

 were sent into New York by Chancellor Livingston, then Minister 

 to France. The Hon. David Humphreys, who "had been minister to 

 France afterwards, got in two hundred more through Portugal into 

 Connecticut. These importations remained unnoticed and almost 

 unknown, until the embargo of 1807 and the non-intercourse cut off 

 our supply of woollen goods from England ; attention was drawn to 

 the necessity of making ourselves independent of a foreign supply of 

 an article as it were a necessary of life, and in 1809 andlslO several 

 thousand merinoes were sent from Spain to the United States by Mr. 

 Jarvis of Vermont, and Mr. Grove of New York, and distributed 

 chiefly in the northern States, but in smaller numbers as far south as 

 Norfolk and Richmond. Subsequently, to wit, in 182G, there arrived 

 in New York, Boston, and other ports, two thousand five hundred 

 Saxony merinos. Such is the basis of the flocks now kept, of pure 

 and of mixed blood, in our northern States, where, according to some 

 interesting statistical accounts on the subject of sheep and wool, 

 compiled in 1836, by Messrs. Benton and Barry, the average price of 

 wool was per pound, in 



1827, 3G cents. 1832, 41 cents. 



1828, 40 " 1833, 52i " 



1829, 29 " 1834, 50 " 



1830, 40^ " 1835, 57 " 



1831, 58 " 1836, 58 " 



Since then, the price has been, according to the best accounts we 

 can get, in 



1838, from 45 to 47 cents. 



1839, from 45 to 60 » 



1840, from 43 to 44 " 



1843 .' from 25 to 30 " 



