148 THE SHEEP. 



except in the hands of the curious, a single flock of the mixed 

 progeny from which so much was anticipated. They have 

 either been abandoned altogether, or the breeders have gra- 

 dually recrossed with English blood, until almost all traces 

 of the Spanish mixture have been lost. 



In place, however, of attempts to engraft the Spanish upon 

 the English stock, other breeders preserved the pure Merinos, 

 and this experiment was greatly more successful than the 

 other. The naturalized Merinos have been found to increase 

 in size, in disposition to fatten, in the power of the females 

 to yield milk, and, by attention in breeding, to improve in 

 the external form. The wool becomes longer, and loses some- 

 what, though not much, of its tenuity, unless, indeed, the 

 means are taken to secure the animals, as in Saxony, from 

 cold, the necessary effect of which is to call forth a greater 

 production of wool for the protection of the animal. The 

 naturalized Merinos have never acquired the hardiness of the 

 native races, and would perish at once on the mountains on 

 which the Welsh, the Cheviot, and the Black-faced Heath- 

 breeds, are acclimated. Nevertheless, analogy conducts us 

 to the conclusion, that the Merinos are capable of becoming, 

 by degrees, adapted to the climate in which they are reared. 



The objections to the cultivation of Merinos in the Bri- 

 tish Islands are not that they cannot be reared, inured to the 

 cold, and improved in form, with a moderate preservation 

 of the characters of the wool, but that they do not, as a 

 breed, equal, in economical importance, those of which we 

 are already possessed. The wool, indeed, is the most va- 

 luable and abundant of that of any race of Sheep that we 

 can rear ; but the wool is not the only profitable produce of 

 Sheep in this country ; and it is by a combination of the pro- 

 duction of mutton and wool, that the interests of the farmer 

 are best served. The breed is in the country, can be ob- 

 tained by every one, and has been the subject of trial by the 

 best farmers ; and yet we see it almost everywhere aban- 

 doned in favour of the native races. Did the British farmer, 

 like the Saxon, derive his principal profit from the fleece, 



