INTRODUCTION. 9 



geration. Facts subsequently ascertained, have, it cannot be denied, niaterially 

 changed the impressions of our flock-masters on this subject. Whether conf«tly 

 or incorrectly, they no longer fear Western competition in growing fine wool. My 

 own coincides with the popular impression on this topic, if we consider that com* 

 petition in its relations to a period not far distant in the future. 



The adoption of these views led me to again turn my attention, never entirely 

 withdrawn, more particularly to the capabilities of the South for this branch of hti8- 

 oandry. My conclusions and the reasons for them will be found in the following 

 Letters. In a letter to Hon. Robert J. Walker, Secretary of the Treasury, pub- 

 lished in his Treasury Report of 1845, and in a series of letters published in the 

 Virginia " Valley Farmer," the same year, I stated some of the general conclu- 

 sions I had then arrived at oji this topic. These publications were followed by 

 .etters from gentlemen residing in Virginia, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, 

 Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas, making farther inquiries, and usually impart- 

 ing more or less local inforaiation on the subject. Some of these were practical 

 men, only seeking information on practical points; others, eminent for intelligence 

 and legislative experience, embraced a more comprehensive field of investigation, 

 and sought from me, as probably from other sources, to ascertain by a wide range 

 of general facts and statistics, the probable bearing, now and in future, of an exten- 

 sive system of wool-growing on the Agriculture, Commerce, Manufactures, domes- 

 tic consumption — in short, the whole domestic economy of our Southern States. 



Answers to these questions demanded careful investigation, and involved a great 

 variety and complexity of details in the practical department of the subject, ren- 

 dered far more numerous by the wide differences existing between the soils, esta- 

 blished husbandry, and even the climates, of the three distinct and well-defined 

 xones already alluded to. The location of some of my correspondents was on ths 

 mountains of Virginia, the Carolinas, and Tennessee — others on the hilly zone ol 

 ibe same States — others on the Tertiary sands of the tide-water zone, and the Cre- 

 taceous plains of the Mississippi and Arkansas. To give opinions on all the topica 

 referred to, and in reference to natural circumstances so various, supported by even 

 a respectable show of corroborating facts, was an undertaking requiring considera- 

 ble time and labor : to repeat them separately to each correspondent, was wholly 

 out of the question. 



Requested by Mr. Skinner, a little more than a year since, to prepare a series of 

 Letters on Sheep Husbandry, and especially on Sheep Husbandry in the South, for 

 The Farmers' Library, it occurred to me that a compliance with his request would 

 ?nable me to answer each of my correspondents by once writing; and moreover, I 

 ijould feel, under such circumstances, that I could properly afford to bestow an 

 amount of time and elaboration on my communications which I should otherwise 

 find impracticable. And I confess, I also thought if the information I could impart 

 would prove of value to my personal correspondents, it might also prove so to many 

 others among the numerous readers of a popular agricultural magazine. The liberal 

 offer of the Publishers to provide all such cuts as I should choose to direct, was an 

 additional inducement to adopt this medium of communication. I have often fel' 

 the want of these in agricultural letters of my own, and in reading the works of 

 others. In describing a breed of sheep, for example, to a person who has nevei 

 Been them, the best chosen words convey but a vague impression. In many othei 

 cases also, cuts exhibit at a glance what it would require much circumlocution Ui 

 describe ; and they in many instances convey ideas to the mind with a definiteness^ 

 correctness, and exemption from possibility of misunderstanding, which words 

 alone never coild. The cuts include portraits of all the breeds which I supposed 

 3onld of possib>.lity possess, or claim to possess, superior value, for any regioo o 



