IMPROVING WOOL AND MARKETING THE FLEECE. 197 



impossible to satisfactorily describe it in words ; the value of the 

 wool is at least doubled, or, for special purposes, quadrupled. 



An interesting attempt, already referred to, to breed a large 

 carcase sheep with a heavy fleece of fine wool has been made 

 on the Cambridge Agricultural Farm, two Merino rams having 

 been mated with Shropshire ewes, the idea being at the second 

 generation (F2) to select the sheep with the large Shropshire body 

 and the fine Merino wool. The Mendelian basis for this experiment 

 lies in the reshuffling of characters which occurs in cross-breeding 

 followed by the artificial selection of the most favourable variety. 

 Unfortunately, the characters of sheep are so many and so varied 

 that it seems impossible to isolate any two or three desirable 

 characters, as in the case of certain plants and animals with which 

 Professors Bateson and Punnett have so successfully worked ; 

 so that the characteristics of mutton, wool, &c., are so variously 

 defined in the progeny of such crosses as the Merino-Shropshire 

 that no satisfactory selection seems possible. In the first genera- 

 tion of this cross it was noticeable that the finest -woolled 

 ram was the smallest bodied and most delicate, and conse- 

 quently was useless ,to breed from with both mutton and 

 wool in view, while further crosses seem to produce no further 

 segregation of either the wool or mutton characteristics, probably 

 due in the first place to the Merino and Shropshire coming in 

 part from the same stock, and partly due, as just explained, 

 to the multitudinous and mixed characters present in even the 

 most characteristic breeds of sheep. Professor Wood's experiments 

 in crossing the hornless blackface Suffolk with the horned pink- 

 face Dorset, however, suggest that Mendelian principles may yet 

 be of use to the sheep -breeder, and although too much must evidently 

 not be expected from the application of these principles, it would 

 obviously be foolish to throw the theory overboard altogether. 

 With practical men, the wish is too often the father to the thought 

 and to the action ; prejudice is rampant, and too often they are 

 unaware of their innate desire to confound every novel suggestion, 

 every out-of-the-common possibility. It is more than probable 

 that, with more hearty co-operation on the part of sheep-breeders, 

 much light might be thrown upon the very important influences 

 of race and environment in heredity. 



The Classification of Wools. Broadly speaking, wools are 

 valuable as possessing : 



(a) Lustre and length, or 

 (6) Fineness and waviness. 



The long lustre wools may be spun and woven into certain character- 

 istic fabrics, such as lustre cloths and bright serges. The so-called 

 " Alpacas " are not infrequently made from long lustre wool. 



