44 



which he shall commence with on the first of December. For these 

 he pays three dollars per head. They will require on an average for 

 twelve weeks, two pounds of hay per day, at $15 per ton or 1^ 

 cents per lb. — $1 26 ; and one pint of Indian corn per day, say at 

 96 cents per bushel, or li cent per pint — $1 26 : total cost, $2 54. 

 This is liberal feed ; and by the first of March his sheep will gene- 

 rally bring him $5 50 to $6. If they are of superior quality, and 

 have had more liberal feeding, they will generally bring in proportion. 

 The attendance is easy, and goes into the general farm labor. If an 

 Ipswich or Rowley farmer sends his hay by an agent to be sold in 

 Boston market on commission, he pays from $4 to ^7 on the sale of 

 it, and the manure is lost. If the Essex farmer will go largely into 

 the raising of ruta baga, he will be able to fatten his wethers at a 

 less expense than we have charged ; and if he will in such case 

 litter his sheep yards abundantly with meadow hay, ferns and brakes, 

 straw, corn butts, or peat mud, he will find a mine of wealth 

 in them in the spring, whose diffusion will spread its golden harvests 

 over his fields. There is no article of feed, which can be given to 

 cattle, which will produce such large secretions of urine as turnips ; 

 and a compost formed in the way described is among the most active 

 and productive manures, which can be applied to the soil. In such 

 experiment the farmer needs, however, to be admonished to under- 

 take it only with sheep in good and thrifty condition. It is a proverb 

 that a sheep is never fat but once ; and attetnpts to fatten a poor 

 sheep will usually end in disappointment. The second important 

 point is to observe the strictest regularity and care in feeding. I 

 speak on the subject of fatting wethers with some confidence, having 

 had many years of careful and exact experience. The near vicinity 

 of the Essex farmer to a market for his mutton gives him great ad- 

 vantage over one living far in the interior. 



A second branch of sheep husbandry, which the Essex farmer 

 may prosecute to great advantage, is the raising of early lambs for 

 the market. I mention one example which may seem trivial, yet a 

 feather may indicate the course of the wind as certainly as a ship 

 under full sail. A farmer in Ipswich had a lamb come on first of 

 January last. He fed the ewe with plenty of succulent vegetables, 

 and he allowed the lamb to have free access to Indian meal, of 



