No. 4.] SIIKEP INDUSTKV. 23 



foinul, and tlio Indians told Iiini the storv as it liad been 

 liaiidi'd down by their old men. 



The cattle were not very nnmcrous, and soon disapp(;ared, 

 but the sheep have staved on many hundreds of the islands 

 until this day. They spread along the coast as far south as 

 Nantucket, and it is not so very long ago that there were 

 considerable numbers left on that island. I am inclined to 

 think that the summer resident along the coast has driven 

 them away, and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty 

 to Animals is now engaged in driving them out of the sheep's 

 paradise of the world, — the islands off the coast of Maine, — 

 and in a few years they will be destroyed. 



On many of those islands, where there were no grass or 

 shrubs, throve a small flock, always fat, which subsisted en- 

 tirely upon seaweed. ]\lany 3'ears ago I got a sample of the 

 rockweed on which they seemed to do the best, and found by 

 analysis that it was very like clover hay and almost exactly 

 like early cut rye, the rye having a little more wood fiber. 



From these islands sprang the best breed of sheep in the 

 world for our conditions then, — the native sheep. They 

 have covered the continent wherever sheep have since been 

 raised, even to far-off Mexico. By in-breeding, by the sur- 

 vival of the fittest, they took a fixed type. A hundred years 

 ago their fleece was nearly twice as heavy as any of the Eng- 

 lish breeds, and their meat was a third more. Of course they 

 were very wild, their nostrils were as sensitive as those of a 

 deer; but they took kindly to captivity when they were taken 

 to the mainland and domesticated. In their wild state they 

 would take to the sea when cornered, if they could, and will 

 to this day, and will live in water in full fleece for half an 

 hour. I have had one, wh(Mi cornered in a brush corral, 

 leap over my head and clear it by two feet to get away. 

 Once I shot a yearling, which weighed, after being dressed 

 and hung in the cellar several days, 78 pounds, and no mut- 

 ton could excel it in eating qualities. 



The title to these sheep passed with the title to the islands; 

 some of them had several hundreds, others less, according to 

 their size. There is yet enough of the pure native sheep to 



