1 16 MODERN SHEEP I BREEDS AND MANAGEMENT. 



for deterioration and if improved the renter receives compensation. 

 The Rev. W. B. Daniel, writing of Cumberland in 1813, says : 

 "In the midst of secluded scenes formed by the involutions of 

 the mountains, uncorrupted by the society of the world, lives one 

 of the most independent, most moral and respectable characters 

 existing the estatesman, as he is called in the dialect of the coun- 

 try. His property is usually from eighty to 200 pounds a year; 

 his mansion forms the central point of his possessions, where, sur- 

 rounded by his own paternal meads and native hills, he passes an 

 inoffensive life; occupied in cultivating the first and browsing the 



Herdwick Ram Mackerell Type. 



last with his large flock of three or four thousand sheep, he trans- 

 mits to his descendants, without diminution or increase, the de- 

 mesne which from his frugal and contented forefathers had de- 

 volved upon him. Hence it is that more frequent instances occur 

 in the deep vales of Cumberland of property being enjoyed for a 

 long series of generations by the same family than in a-ny other 

 part of England. 



"Their sheep roving wild upon the mountains and never 

 taken into the farmyard, are exposed to perpetual accidents from 

 the inclemency of the weather and the horrors of snowstorms 

 which have -destroyed from 1,290 to 1,500 head in a year. This 

 circumstance prevents the estatesmen from getting rich, but, on 



