ROMAN CAMP TO ATHELSTANEFOllD. 119 



Most East Lothian farmers liogg and shear their 

 lambs, and sell them fat in spring and early summer. 

 When the breeders do not hogg them, they sell them 

 for that purpose to feeders in the county about the time 

 of St. BoswelPs fair; and the cross-bred lambs from 

 the Lammermoor farms go up then to the little East 

 Lothian fair of Oldhamstocks. On the low farms 

 cast half-bred ewes bougjit in from 38s. to 40s., 

 from Gala Water and all the district through which 

 the North British runs from Edinburgh to Hawick, 

 are in a majority of ten to one over the Cheviot, 

 The cast Cheviot ewes at about 28s. greatly prepon- 

 derate on the higher farms. They come for the 

 most part from Peebleshire and the Lammermoors. 

 where they graze on the braes and the best of the 

 hill land, while the blackfaces hold the muir ground 

 on the summits ; and some farmers go to Falkirk for 

 them. Mr. Douglas speaks of them as good nurses^ 

 not perhaps so prolific as the half-bred ewe, but 

 rearing their lambs to a greater weight when kept 

 till they are wedders, and feeding nearly as well. It is 

 always desirable that the lambs should be dropped in 

 April. If they are sold fat off grass, they are gene-- 

 rally gone by Midsummer, and then the ewes get 

 cake and corn, and are turned off fat before the end of 

 July. If ewes stay on the farm for eleven months they 

 pay about eight-pence to nine-pence a week, including 

 the lamb, but the lack of young grass prevents their 

 being kept to any great extent. Efforts have been: 

 made to supplement young grass by mangold, but;. 



