LINCOLN SHEEP 97 



among the British long-woolled breeds, are in many 

 respects not unlike the Kent sheep, and may have a 

 common origin in the white-faced Flanders sheep, 

 but they are distinctly larger, and their wool is 

 longer and more lustrous. Whether this lustre is 

 an advantage or not depends upon the fashions in 

 ladies' garments. At that time the turn of the wheel 

 was against the Lincolns, but only a few years ago 

 the Bradford manufacturers required to have a shining 

 fibre and the Lincoln wool was at the top of the 

 market. But what has made the fame of the Lincolns 

 has been their value for crossing with the Merinos 

 in Australia, New Zealand, and the Argentine, where 

 the demand for a sheep that would yield a better 

 carcase than the Merino something that could be 

 exported as mutton, and would yet retain part of 

 the immense wool-producing capacity of the latter 

 breed, has been chiefly met by the introduction of 

 Lincoln-Merino cross-breds. Hence has come a great 

 foreign trade in the best Lincoln rams, and prices on 

 occasion have soared up to fabulous heights, more 

 than a thousand guineas having been paid for a 

 single ram. Our host possessed a noted flock, and 

 we saw several of his rams which had just returned 

 from the summer shows rams in some cases that 

 would have left the country but for the embargo 

 caused by the Yorkshire outbreak of foot-and-mouth 

 disease. Some of these had been left unshorn from 

 birth just to show what they could do in the way 

 of producing wool, and then resembled nothing so 

 much as an occasional table with too big a cloth 

 upon it, so squarely had their backs been trimmed 

 and so level were the locks that swept the ground 

 on either side. Of course these were fancy articles, 

 but they carried nearly 30 Ib. of wool apiece, and \ve 



