ANIMAL INDUSTRIES 255 



but wool growing for the whole world could not be 

 overdone and I concluded that good wool-growing 

 sheep, which are also good mutton sheep (though for 

 that purpose alone not equal to the English breeds 

 mentioned above) are best adapted to the wants of 

 growers on this coast and I have paid most particular 

 attention to the breeding of the merinos, both French 

 and Spanish." 



This conclusion of Patterson was practically that 

 of all wool-growers, and for several decades the dis- 

 tinctively mutton breeds did not regain their popu- 

 larity of the fifties. In fact, it has only been within 

 the last two decades that the mutton breeds began 

 to gain the recognition to which they are now entitled 

 in this State and their relation to a new phase of 

 California sheep husbandry has become clear. 



As has been shown, Californians had introduced 

 practically all the known kinds of Merinos during the 

 first decade of American occupation. It would be 

 interesting to note some of the details of the way 

 they contended for supremacy, but only the result 

 can be mentioned, which was the survival of two 

 Merinos, the Spanish or American and the French. 

 The latter contributed very little to the greatest 

 wool achievement for there were very few flocks 

 kept pure at the time of the greatest wool produc- 

 tion, though they did survive and are now far more 

 influential and popular than forty years ago. Patter- 

 son wrote in 1867: "The first pure merino sheep 

 introduced into this state were purchased at my 

 farm in Chautauqua County, New York, by Searle & 



