58 



repetition. They have been carried into almost every State, 

 and, cither pure or mixed, constitute a very large proportion 

 of the sheep of the northern section of the Republic. Of 

 twenty-six communications addressed to L. A. Morrell, Esq., 

 the editor of the American Shepherd, fifteen are from breeders 

 of Merinos, nine Saxonies, one South Down, one Lincoln; 

 and the communications came from Vermont, Connecticut, New 

 Hampshire, New York, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and 

 Virginia. 



The circumstances attending their arrival in this country 

 were by no means fortunate. Fabulous accounts of the profits 

 to be derived from them, excited a spirit of speculation, which 

 ended, as it usually does, in the ruin of a large proportion of 

 those who were carried away by it. The real value of the ani- 

 mal, great as it is, was lost sight of in the attempt of interested 

 parties, to give him supernatural powers for enriching every 

 one who purchased him. But long before the generation which 

 dealt with Merinos as if they were fancy stocks had passed 

 away, a fixed value was established for them as farm animals, 

 almost equal to that which had been placed upon them by the 

 speculator. 



Some of the soundest agriculturists in our country foresaw 

 this result, even when the excitement was at its height. Hon. 

 John Lowell, in an address before the Massachusetts Society 

 for Promoting Agriculture, in 1818, called the attention of 

 farmers to the subject ; and, after referring to the advantages 

 which had been derived from the introduction of Merinos into 

 many European countries, as shown by long experience, he 

 relates the success which attended their breeding, in one in- 

 stance, in France, by M. Morel de Vinde : — 



" In 1805, only thirteen years since, he began an establish- 

 ment with 2 rams and 92 ewes, of the Merino breed. In 

 eleven lambings this moderate flock produced 1087 males, and 

 1001 females; total, 2088; of which he lost by disease 354. 

 He sold 534, and had remaining in good health at the end of 

 eleven years 1200 — the produce of his original stock of 94. 



