EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 39 



(1 nun." The regulation referred to cattle alone, probably, for it is not 

 known that Haverhill had any sheep until 1684, when "the proprietors 

 of the Great Plain, thinking- to lay down the said field for some years 

 to be improved for a sheep pasture" the town gave them leave to fence 

 it. choose officers, and make all necessary regulations for that purpose. 

 Three years later, in 1687, the town took this action : 



It being the interest and desire of the inhabitants, for the sake of back, belly, and 

 purse, to get into a stock, and a way to keep a stock of sheep, in which all en- 

 deavors hitherto have been invalid and of no eifect, for a further trial the selectmen 

 have hereby power granted them to call forth the inhabitants capable of labor with 

 suitable tools and in suitable companies, about Michaelmas, to clear some land at 

 the town's end, sides, or skirts, as they in their discretion shall think meet to direct, 

 to make it capable and fit for sheep to feed upon with the less hazard; and he that 

 is warned as above, and doth not accordingly come and attend the service, shall pay 

 a fine of 2s. per day. 



The great hazard of sheep raising here, as in other towns, was 

 occasioned by the ravages of wolves among the flocks. In addition to 

 the bounty paid by the colony for their destruction, Haverhill for a 

 long period paid 40 shillings for every wolf killed in the town. ]^ew- 

 bury, in 1644, ordered that for every wolf killed with hounds 10 shillings 

 should be paid, and if with a trap, or otherwise, 5 shillings; provided 

 the heads were brought to the meeting house and nailed up and the 

 constable duly notified; and in the Hampton records of the same year 

 is found this similar declaration: "It is hereby declared that every 

 townsman which shall kill a wolf and bring the head thereof and nayle 

 the same to a little red oak tree at the north east end of the meeting 

 house, shall have 10 shillings a wolfe for their paynes." Amesbury, in 

 1642, offered a bounty for every wolf killed, which was increased to 20 

 shillings in 1687, and repealed in 1696; but forty-two years later, in 

 1738, a bounty of 5 pounds was voted for "every wolf that shall be 

 killed," in order to save the sheep from these ravenous beasts. To clear 

 the forests of these pests was no small part of the labor of the primitive 

 settler, and he hunted them with gun and traps. A mode of catching 

 them with hooks is described: 



Four mackerel hooks are bound with brown thread and wool wrapped around 

 tlR-iii, and they are dipped into melted tallow till they are as big and round as an 

 egg. This thing, thus prepared, is laid by some dead carcase, which toles the wolves. 

 It is swallowed by them, and is the means of their being taken. 



By the end of the seventeenth century sheep had so far multiplied 

 that all wool needed for domestic purposes or homespun manufacture 

 was abundant, and some towns had a surplus for trade and export. 

 Particularly was this the case with Nantucket, where sheep were intro- 

 duced in 1660, at its first settlement by the proprietors, and where a 

 prosperous business was carried on in exporting wool until 1675, when 

 it was prohibited ; most families had looms of their own ; spinning-wheels 

 were common and fulling-mills were being put up at every favorable 

 point on the small streams. Yet, says Weeden, the weaving was not 



