CLIMATIC INFLUENCES. 113 



variety, or even a cross of it by other and improved breeds, 

 with rams selected from quite different localities; that is, 

 for the mountain ranges the Lincoln or the Leicester or the 

 Shropshire rams may be used, but it would not be advisable 

 to introduce these breeds wholly and suddenly into these 

 entirely different conditions; and for lowland flocks ^it may 

 be safe to cross them with the Romney Marsh rams, or with 

 a sheep, such as the Cheviot, reared in an intermediate local- 

 ity, neither mountain nor plain. Strong variations are always 

 to be deprecated, but may be made gradually by the use 

 of sheep from an intermediate locality, or which have been 

 acclimatated by one or two years residence. So the Merino, 

 naturalized by centuries of adaptation to warm dry climates, 

 to lowland pastures, to mountain ranging, and which has ex- 

 hibited wonderful endurance and facility in meeting and suc- 

 cessfully surmounting any supposed difficulties in these 

 ways, has proved itself a true cosmopolitan, and meets every 

 expectation of the shepherd in every part of the world. 

 We find it in the cold, snowy northern New England fields; 

 in the dry plains of California; in the hot climate of Central 

 America or Southern Africa, or the rainless ranges of Aus- 

 tralia; as well as on our Western prairies, and the vast 

 ranges of our great Northwest. And it should be the busi- 

 ness of shepherds to study out the natural history of the 

 sheep and its characteristics, as given in a preceding chap- 

 ter, and thus make himself acquainted with the special, 

 natural, or acquired disposition of the sheep he fancies, be- 

 fore he commits himself to cosily enterprises. 



As may be understood, acclimatation is the process of 

 adaptation by which animals brought from different locali- 

 ties are rendered by gradual steps able to withstand the coudi- 

 tdons of their new localities, and to not only survive but 

 flourish under these strange circumstances in countries re- 

 mote from their native habitation and under wholly differ- 

 ent climatic effects. Even with the human race, coloniza- 

 tion has been attempted disastrously except by slow degrees, 

 and frequently only by the crossing, by intermarriage, of 

 Europeans with the native races. The history of British In- 

 dia affords an example of this difficulty of acclimatating our 

 race, used to sustain all kinds of hardships, and resist the 

 most extreme variations of climate. But the effects of the 



