Essarj on Sheep, 131, 



the better for being well kept, yet they will not 

 SiiiFer more from neglect; their thick and close 

 fleeces fit them for bearing cold, and they will 

 in every mixed flock be found among the most 

 thrifty in the severest weather. The objec* 

 tion to their size I have shown to be ill found- 

 ed, if he draw his stock from the improved 

 Merino; and even if he begins with one of 

 the small race, he will, in some years, by 

 breeding out of good ewes, advance gradually 

 to the size of the dams. Nor let him be under 

 the least apprehension that he will not in this 

 way have as fine wool as if he bred out of full- 

 blood ewes. It is now so well established as 

 not even to admit of the smallest doubt, that a 

 Merino in the fourth generation, from even the 

 worst wooUed ewes, is in every respect equal to 

 the stock of the sire. No diflcrence is now 

 made in Europe in the choice of a ram, whe- 

 ther he is a full-bred or fifteen-sixteenths. In- 

 deed, Dr. Parry maintains, from his own expe- 

 rience, that they are superior to full-blood rams. 

 He says that the wool of his flock (which con- 

 sists of sheep in the fourth generation from the 

 Ryeland ewes) was injured when he put a fine 

 full-blood Spanish ram to it; and asserts, that 

 any person beginning a stock with an imported 

 ram, will be eight years behind one that begins 



