156 BOAED OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



that the owners thought best suited to their climate and soil. 

 In Australia they run for wool, without paying any particular 

 attention to mutton. In New Zealand they pay attention to 

 mutton, and wool is a side issue. The reason they do not 

 raise mutton in Australia is tliat they do not want to, for the 

 wool is more profital)le. The only place, — I say this with 

 some fear and diffidence, because of the different opinion 

 held in Vermont, — in my judgment, where they still cling 

 tenaciously to the small body of the Merino, is in Australia, 

 because they fit into the requirements of their wool industry ; 

 for they want wool and not body, and the difficulties of the 

 situation seem to be met in that way. 



The Mexican sheep is a wild, primitive sheep, descended 

 from sheep brought over by Columbus on his second voyage 

 and left at Panama ; and the Spanish brought sheep from 

 Spain. From these sheep have descended the numerous 

 flocks of sheep in Mexico, which have reverted l)ack, just as 

 mankind would revert back, were it not for the influences 

 continually pressing him forward. The Mexican sheep have 

 reverted back to the original type. Instead of wool, they 

 grow hair, and are small in body. One important thing 

 about them is that they respond with most marvelous rapid- 

 ity to the introduction of improved blood. In an astonish- 

 ingly short period you can convert a flock of Mexican sheep 

 into a flock of good wool-bearing sheep, by the use of im- 

 proved rams. 



This Rambouillet breed that I have been talking about, its 

 descendants are scattered through the United States and 

 Europe and South America. This Rambouillet type is like 

 the Jewish race, — the product of in-breeding. The Jewish 

 race is one of our strongest, most enduring races, and it is a 

 race in which in-breeding has been the rule. On the general 

 subject of in-breeding I am not so well informed as many in 

 the audience." As I understand it, in every-day work and 

 every-day business it is to be avoided. The ranchman of 

 the west changes his rams every two or three years, if he can 

 afford to. He practises discrimination and care and study in 

 the selection of the best animals. I think a great deal of in- 

 jury has been done to sheep husbandry in New England by 

 careless in-breeding, by the multiplication of defects, by the 



