AUGUST. 40 



covering that number by a ram better than any of 

 your own, the flock must be on the improving 

 hand ; and this may be done at a very small ex- 

 pence. 



This moment of setting the stock lambs is,, that 

 of adding to, or diminishing the number of a flock, 

 by keeping more or fewer than the crones sold. 

 This is a very material part of the business: on a 

 farm 'with a given stationary sheep-walk, it is pro- 

 bably regulated by circumstances that rarely change; 

 but on enclosed farms, where the sheep are sup- 

 ported by fields alternately in grass and tillage, 

 variations may easily be supposed, and the question 

 of hard or light stocking, that is, of close feeding 

 or a head of grass, then comes in to decide the 

 number kept. If the produce cr profit per head is 

 looked to, the conduct to be pursued is evidently 

 to stock lightly; but if the return is looked for in 

 corn, from fields laid down for refreshment by rest, 

 tken close feeding is a very material point, and the 

 number kept will depend on it. With all the 

 grasses, &c. that do not decline from age, the 

 more sheep jou keep, the more you may keep, and 

 the more corn you will reap when such are ploughed ; 

 a circumstance too important to be forgotten. But 

 the young farmer will remember, that upon this 

 system he must not have a show flock, or let the 

 vanity of a farm have the least influence with him; 

 if in this way he will have something to talk of, 

 a score or two of pampered favourites, the fewer 



the 



