SHEEP HUSBANDRY IN THE SOUTH. 151 



from the effects of wet and cold ; the fleece averaging about 3.^ lbs. Foi-msrly the wool waa 

 extensively euijiloyed for making cloths, but having given place to the finer .Saxony wools, 

 it hits sunk i.'i price, and been confined to combing purposes. It has thus become altogether 

 a secondary coiiMideratioa." . . . 



If Mr. Spooner is not made to say that the wool is " fine" by an omis- 

 sion of qualifying words, or some other misprint, his ideas ofjf.ncness must 

 lie singular indeed ! The South-Down wool, rejected for carding pur 

 Dos(;s, is several shades finer than the Cheviot! The latter is of about the 

 quality of Leicester, the number of serrations about the same, and, says 

 iVIr. Youatt, speaking of tlie microscopic apjiearance of the wool, " the 

 derivation of the breed (from the Leicester) is well illustrated by the 

 formation of the fibre." 



Mr. .John Varley, maimfacturer, of Stanningley, near Leeds, thus testi 

 fied before the Lords' Committtfe :* 



" I attribute the low price of Cheviot wool to deterioration ; it is deteriorated very much 

 in point of hair ; it was fm-merly the fasliioii of the day for Cheviot wool to be woni as cloth ; 



it is not the fashion now. It is !iot fit to make fine cloths, as it was then The wool 



is grown coarser and longer, and only fit to make low coatings and flushings." 



This is confirmed by the testimony of other witnesses before the Com- 

 mittee; and Mr. Youatt on the same subject remarks, t "that the wool is 

 inferior to the South-Down." 



Broad-tah-ed Asiatic and African Sheep. — I allude to the Broad- 

 lailed race of sheep, not from any high estimate which I place upon their 

 value, but because they constitute one of the breeds now existing in a 

 state of purity in the United States. 



Some " Tunisian Mountain Sheep " were received by Col. Pickering 

 when alnoad, and were distributed by him in Pennsylvania.^ They are 

 highly spoken of by Col. Powell as a cross with the Dishley and South- 

 Down. They have, I believe, long since become extinct. 



It was Commodore Porter, I think, who, you informed me, sent homo 

 some of the Broad-tailed sheep of Asia, obtained from Smyrna, pure- 

 blooded descendants oi which yet exist in South Carolina.|| I have care- 

 fully examined the specimens of wool of the full blood and the grades of 

 this variety forwarded by you. No. 3, taken from the skin of a iull-blood,. 

 is S inches long, pure white, consisting of coarse hairs, uneven in theip 

 length atid diameter — the same hair of uneven diameter in dilferent parts 

 of it, and the whole intermixed for about 4 inches from the roots, with a* 

 fine, downy or cottony wool. No. 2, abftut 3| inches long from the sidte- 

 of a three-fourths blood ram, is much evener in quality, with no hairs a»- 

 'oarse or wool as fine as in No. 3. It contains some jarr, or short, sharij- 

 ^/ointed hairs, and is a dry, and, I should judge, rather unworkable wooli. 

 not iceU adapted to either carding or combing. No. 1, from thigh of same- 

 animal, is 8 inches long, resembles N ). 3, but not so great a distinction 

 between the hair and the wool. No. 4, from a three-fourths blood 4-year- 

 old ewe, is about 2 inches long, contains a few colored haii-s, resembles 

 No. 2. but is somewhat coarser. All these samples are destitute of yolk, 

 and apparently come from loose, light, dry, open fleeces. They do not 

 strike me as wools which could be as profitably cultivated as many others^ 

 for any objects or under any circumstances. 



If the object is mutton instead of wool, it seems to me that a better se- 

 lection can be made, from some of the English breeds — which intermingle 



* Bisthoff, vol ii , p. 144. Mr. Youatt quotes the substance of the above, and fully sustains Mr Varlev'i 

 ^ews. t Q. v., p. 2-<5. ' 



I See Essay on Various Breeds of Sheep, by Col. John Hare Powell, published in the Memoirs of tha 

 Board of Acriciiltuie of the State of New- York, vol. iii., p. 377, (lg26.) 



II \n I,etter Vth I inadvertently spoke of these as a large breed of sheep. They are not above mediiM 

 •ize OI rather, may be stud to be a smalish race. 



