366 FIELD AND FERX. 



Muir belongs principally to the Duke of Buccleucli^ 

 and is rented at 7s. to 9s. 6d. per sheep. The best 

 land is clay, with mossy bogs, and black at the bottom. 

 The drains are eighteen inches deep, and placed eight 

 to ten yards apart, and renewed every four or five 

 years at the tenant^s expense. Where the pick 

 does not " come in to pick your pocket," the making 

 generally costs about nine shillings per hundred rods 

 of eighteen feet. As for the old '^penny pie con- 

 cern,''^ of twelve to thirty yards apart, it has gone 

 quite out. 



The Mawkey ewe was in the paddock near the 

 house with her twelfth set of lambs ; and two fawn 

 greyhounds, coupled to keep them out of mischief, 

 were the first to give us greeting. The flock has 

 been in the family for nearly eighty years, and 

 the Cheviot pedigree goes back for fully half that 

 time ; but save an occasional grey-leg, no trace of 

 the primitive blackface comes out. Mr. Brydon^s 

 uncle showed sheep at Stirling about 1830, and won 

 a tea service for the best Cheviot ; and in 1840 Mr. 

 Brydon came to Moodlaw. 



His great object has been to get them shorter and 

 thicker, especially above the knee, or " the butcher's 

 grip,'' wide between the forelegs, with hard white hair 

 on the crown, deep in the girth, well-woolled below 

 and on the arms and thighs, with a fine park-ranging 

 neck, light and clefty in the bone, white on the legs, 

 and black on the nose. A flat crown and too pointed 

 ears are points he has always struggled against ; and 



