114 THE SHEEP. 



should be preserved in its native purity. Every mixture of 

 stranger blood has been found to lessen that character of 

 hardiness which is the distinguishing character of the race. 

 The beautiful breed of the South Downs would seem to be of 

 all others that which is best adapted to improve the Cheviot ; 

 and yet the experiments that have hitherto been made have 

 shewn, that the mixed progeny is inferior to the native 

 Cheviot, in its adaptation to a country of cold and humid 

 mountains. 



The Cheviot Breed, it has been seen, has been gradually 

 extending throughout the mountainous parts of Scotland. It 

 has penetrated southward in the part of the central chain of 

 elevated moors from which the Heath Breed has been derived. 

 It might be yet greatly more extended in this direction, and 

 supersede many of the flocks of ill-formed animals which in- 

 habit this range. It has been carried to Wales, to the high 

 lands of Dartmoor and Exmoor, and in small numbers into 

 Cornwall. In all these cases it has been found superior to 

 the native races. It has even been carried by settlers to the 

 boundless wastes of New South Wales ; but the suitable 

 breed for that country, in which the wool alone is of value, is 

 the Merino, although, as we shall afterwards have occasion 

 to see, some of the Long-woolled Breeds may, with advantage, 

 be transported to this magnificent Colony. 



X. THE OLD NORFOLK BREED. 



A remarkable variety of Sheep, usually termed the Old 

 Norfolk Breed, occupies the higher lands of Norfolk, Suffolk, 

 and Cambridge. These Sheep, once very numerous in the 

 heathy districts of this part of England, are a wild and hardy 

 race, well fitted for a country of scanty herbage. Both sexes 

 are armed with horns, which, in the male, are thick and spiral. 

 Their limbs are long and muscular, their bodies are long, 

 and their general form betokens activity and strength. They, 



