SHEEP 157 



wicks were a white or rimy-faced, hornless breed, and any horns on 

 either male or female were looked upon as a sign of some intermixture 

 with the native Black-faced sheep, as were also black specks on the face 

 and legs. At the Newcastle Royal Show in 1864 two of the prize rams were 

 without horns ; and although horns in the male have become fashion- 

 able as giving a more masculine appearance, there are still some good 

 rams without horns at the present time. In 1880 H. J. Little says 

 "it is worth notice that the Herdwick tups are sometimes horned 

 and sometimes polled, but generally the former. Castration almost 

 invariably prevents the growth of horns, and the females are never 

 cornute. They are not great breeders." 



H. H. Dixon's description of the ewes in 1866, when he says : 

 " the absence of horn in the female is not a desirable sign " is clearly 

 a mistake, for at no period in the history of breed have horns been 

 permitted in the female, though they occur now and then. In con- 

 firmation of this, the statement in the Manchester Guardian* when the 

 Royal Show was at Manchester in 1869, on the Herdwicks that " The 

 tups now have horns with two or three curls, and if the ewes are 

 without these it denotes want of hardihood " was immediately con- 

 tradicted by a letter to the papers from W. J. Browne, the secretary 

 of the Troutbeck Sheep Association ; he wrote : " The above assertion 

 is not the case ; but on the contrary the possession of them in the 

 female denotes want of breeding, the animal under such circumstances 

 being considered a mongrel. The whole of the persons showing were 

 members of this Association." 



The report in the Field on the Herdwicks at the Royal Show at 

 Carlisle in 1880, is not flattering to the breed : " They look like the 

 last remnant of, we wont say barbarism, but of very ancient and 

 primitive sheep breeding. The judges at Carlisle confirmed this 

 view by giving the prizes, in the shearling ram classes, to the sheep 

 that had the least hair around the neck and the fewest black spots 

 about the backs and sides ; but in the older rams they had not much 

 choice, so the prizes went to goaty-looking animals that had long 

 black and brown ruffs of hair around their necks and long grey beards. 

 The ewes were so small and light that a man might easily have taken 



♦ It is probable that H. H. Dixon, wrote the article complained of in the Manchester 



Guardian, 



