Essay on Sheep. 147 



own wool into fine cloth for the market ! I will 

 venture to say, that cloth of ten dollars the yard 

 may, in this way, be made superior in quality 

 to British cloth, though perhaps not quite so 

 well dressed, for three dollars per yard, of seven 

 quarters wide, and give the farmer a profit of three 

 dollars per pound for his wool, after allowing 

 one dollar as a commission to the shop-keepers 

 who sell his cloth. It is but justice, however, 

 to the sheep I have mentioned, to wit, the 

 Arlington breed, to observe, that their fleeces 

 are adapted to purposes, to w^hich those of 

 the Merino cannot be applied with the same 

 advantage; such as, the making of worsteds, 

 camblets, sergers, and perhaps fine blankets. 

 These manufactures require long combing wool, 

 whereas cloth demands fine short w^ool, and 

 one cannot be substituted for the other without 

 loss. Wool which is intermediate is on that 

 account inferior to either, as not being well 

 adapted to cloth, and too short for comb- 

 ing. This is in some sort the character of 

 the new Leicester or Bakewell wool; were it a 

 few inches longer or shorter, it would sell much 

 higher than it now does ; its present price in the 

 British market is only ten-pence sterling per 

 pound, and yet it is of a tolerably fine staple. 

 As it is my wish to direct the choice of the 



