102 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



in Spain, smnprgled a ram and two ewes on to the ship Bald 

 Eagle, Capt. John Atkins, and after a long passage and some 

 sickness, landed them safely in Boston and gave them to his friend 

 Andrew Cragie, Esq., of Cambridge ; there being then no man- 

 ufactories, and perhaps no proper appreciation of their splendid 

 fleeces, and being probably a trouble to Mr. Cragie, he killed 

 and ate them ; fifteen years after that time he paid for similar 

 sheep •$ 1,000 a piece. ' Gen. David Humphreys, of Connecti- 

 cut, in 1802, when Minister to Spain under Mr. Jefferson, 

 imported a flock of two hundred, which he bred and increased 

 with snch success as in 1807 to have made several hundred 

 yards of fine cloth, for which he received a gold medal from 

 the " Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture." Some 

 of those sheep were brought into Franklin County at that time 

 by Capt. David Dennison, and the direct blood of that stock 

 exists there to this day. 



Chancellor Livingston, of New York, imported a few, and 

 in 1809-10, the late Hon. William Jarvis, of Wethersficld, Vt., 

 commonly known as Consul Jarvis, imported very largely, 

 and to him more than any one, is due the rapid advance in 

 manufactures of fine wool, which were pursued with more zeal 

 than discretion ; for every other branch of agriculture suffered 

 from the undue importance attached to growing fine wool. 



The attention of the country was about that time almost 

 entirely directed to wool growing, and manufactures and the 

 Merino rose into supreme importance ; so great was the interest 

 excited, that a thousand, and fourteen hundred dollars a head 

 were paid for them. Unfortunately, some of the later importa- 

 tions arrived in the worst possible condition, bringing with them 

 those scourges of their race, the scab and the foot rot. 



Tlie ^fcrino is a patient, docile animal, bearing much confine- 

 ment without injury to health ; accurate experiments have 

 shown that it requires a little over two pounds of hay per day 

 in winter, while the Leicester will consume nearly four. 



The Merino is a far better breeder than other fine-woolled 

 sheep, and it is said that the lambs when dropped are hardier 

 than the Leicester ; the fleece is fine, though small, the 

 average being in this State, only three pounds and two 

 ounces, though some flocks shear four pounds. The French 

 and Silesian Merinos, originally of Spanish stock, have been 



