84* Dr. Parry's Essay on the Nature, Produce, Origin, 



CHAPTER n. 



Merino Sheep in Spain ; their Form ; Quality and Weight of their Fleeces- 

 Difference of Flocks. Yolk. Loss of Weight in scouring. Chemical Nature 

 of the Yolk. Equality of Wool in different Parts of the Fleece. Wool of the 

 Lambs. Constitution and Habits of Merino Sheep. The Rams only horned. 

 Increase of the Species. Merinos rarely eaten. Pastures. Travelling. Shear- 

 ing. Sorting the Wool ; washing it. Lamb's Wool. Wool of the Estantes. 

 Diseases; the Scab; Giddiness; the Claveau. Nature of the Mesta. 



The fine wool imported into England is the produce of a breed of sheep called in 

 Spain Merinos. 



The number of these sheep, according to the latest information, amounts to about 

 feye millions. They are divided into two sorts; the Trashumantes, and Estantes. 

 These terms are not meant to indicate any difference in the species, but are Spa- 

 nish participles, merely importing that the former travel, and that the latter are 

 stationary. 



The Merino sheep in Spain is an animal below the middle size, comparatively 

 with our native English breeds, and probably about that of the pure Ryeland, or 

 old South Down. Though these sheep possess a great deal of picturesque beauty, 

 and are exactly such as Rosa of Tivoli and others of the best painters have chosen 

 as models, from which to decorate their immortal works, they are by no means 

 furnished with that form, which modern fancy or experience has presumed to be 

 inseparably connected with a disposition to early maturity and fatness. Thus they 

 are, in general, rather high on their legs. Their heads are large, and their necks 

 long. Their chests are contracted, and therefore they are sharp on the shoulders and 

 flat sided. They are also narrow across the loins ; whence it inevitably follows, 

 that their hind quarter is strait and defective. 



In all these respects, however, there is great difference in individuals of the 

 same flock, and more especially in the general character of form in different flocks 

 of this race. 



The defects which I have mentioned are, however, in some degree counterbalanced 



