

EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 145 



fine wool will be a great article of export from the Northern States, if the injustice 

 and mad policy of the manufacturing nations of Europe do not compel us to work it 

 up at home. 1 am, therefore, solicitous to hear at what price the several grades of 

 wool herewith sent are valued in England. It is certain that none of the sheep 

 which have been of late imported into the United States from Spain, of which there 

 are many, bear any proportion to mine, either in weight or quality of the fleeces, 

 besides being very inferior to them in the beauty of their forms, in which, indeed, 

 none excel those of Rainbouillet. 



Of this shearing a contemporary account says: "It was highly grat- 

 ifying to observe many of the gentlemen clothed in elegant suits of 

 Merino wool." They sat down to an elegant, sumptuous dinner; plenty 

 and conviviality diffused a smile over every countenance, and then it is 

 presumed the sale began. 



Muuy made selections from the stock, and it was observed that farmers who had 

 never before listened to the reports in favor of the Merino breed were now convinced 

 of their superior value, and immediately became purchasers, or gave orders for sheep 

 ito be delivered to them on a future day. 



By these annual sales Livingston's Merinos were widely disseminated 

 in the western counties of Massachusetts and Connecticut, and in the 

 State of Uew York. In 1807 Elkanah Watson, a pioneer in the woolen 

 manufacture, introduced into Berkshire County, Mass., since noted for 

 its excellent cloth manufactures, the first pair of Merino sheep from the 

 Livingston stock, and the sheep were shown by him at the fair at Pitts- 

 field, October 1, 1810, one of the first agricultural fairs ever held in 

 America. From the fleeces of these first sheep in 1808 William Scho- 

 field made a piece of blue cloth, superior to any yet made in the coun- 

 try. Samples were sent to different cities and accounts of it were pub- 

 lished, with the cost of manufacture, and excited much interest through- 

 out the country. He received at this time 50 to 60 cents per yard for 

 weaving broadcloth. Mr. Watson calculated that there would be 1,500 

 full-blooded and mixed Merinos in Berkshire County in 1810, and inci- 

 dentally remarked that Humphreys, of Connecticut, George Booth, of 

 Dutchess County, N. Y., and George Upton, of Columbia, with others, 

 were manufacturing cloths from Merino wool. 



We have no means of knowing how near Mr. Watson came to the sheep 

 census of Berkshire in 1810, but we find it recorded that in 1815, within 1 

 mile of Pittsfield, in that county, there were over 8,000 sheep, mostly 

 Merinos, as follows: 



Full-blood Merinos 435 



Fifteen-sixteenths blood 388 



Seven- eighths blood 898 



Three-fourths blood 2,299 



Five-eighths blood 170 



One-half blood 3,048 



One-fourth blood 388 



Common sheep 852 



Total 8,478 



10 



