EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 669 



TENNESSEE. 



This State lias all the natural advantages for sheep husbandry that 

 are possessed by Kentucky, with the additional one of a more temperate 

 climate. The climate embraced within the limits of the State is "pecu- 

 liar iii the fact that it is greatly modified by reason of mountain eleva- 

 tions, and is not what latitude alone would determine." In the valley 

 of east Tennessee the climate is not so much modified by elevation as 

 by the direction of the winds which rush up the valleys from the south- 

 west, laden with a fructifying moisture, and producing a highly genial, 

 productive, and healthy climate. The mean temperature here in sum- 

 mer is not far from 74. On the mountains of east Tennessee and in 

 the valleys the grasses are exceedingly luxuriant and nutritious. Blue 

 grass, herds grass, white clover, mountain meadow, Randall grass, and 

 many wild but valuable kinds are so intermixed as to supply constant 

 grazing during the entire summer and early fall. The temperature of 

 the mountains is cool, and the climate exceedingly moist. Prof. Kille- 

 brew says: 



Iii fully half the time in summer the tops are wrapped in cloud and mist, and rains 

 are remarkably frequent in summer and snows in winter. The frequent rains keep 

 the grasses in a growing condition, and an equal acreage of pasture upon the rich, 

 black, feldspathic soil of the mountain will probably supply double the grazing that 

 it would in the valleys below. In no part of the celebrated blue grass region of Ken- 

 tucky is the sod better or thicker than upon the balds of some of these mountains. 

 For wool-producing sheep this region has no superior in this or any other country, 

 if they could be provided with suitable protection against the chilling rains. The 

 cold blasts of winter may be averted by the sheltering caves. The tropical heats of 

 the valley in summer are unknown upon these airy heights. 



The native sheep found on these mountains are the descendants of 

 the pioneer sheep taken into that country by the early settlers from 

 Virginia and North Carolina. They are strong and healthy, as fleet as 

 the deer and almost as wild. Their wool is white, soft, firm, lustrous, 

 and true, and the sheep show a wonderful adaptation to the locality 

 which they occupy. Experienced sheep-raisers on these mountains say 

 that the higher the grazing grounds the better the wool. On the other 

 hand carcasses increase in size as the grazing grounds approach the 

 valley until the largest size of carcass is met within the many long, 

 straight, and beautiful valleys that characterize the great valley of east 

 Tennessee. One of the most enterprising sheep-breeders of Tennessee 

 thus speaks of the native sheep : 



The sheep most numerous with us, called the native or the scrub, are of foreign 

 origin, brought over to this country by our ancestors from different portions of 

 Europe, each bringing the favorite breed of their immediate district, and from them 



rang the race of sheep now known as natives. From no care at all in breeding, 

 except to let them breed indiscriminately among themselves without any regard to 

 improvement, their type, as a breed, is as well fixed as any of the carefully bred 

 European breeds ; they can be selected from any other breed by the most casual 

 observer. This is the breed of which probably nine-tenths of the sheep of the State 



