1867. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



339 



indifferent share of the scanty crop which he 

 raised. 



The condition of the people must have been 

 poor indeed, in the 14th and 15th centuries. 

 Then there were few glass windows, "for at 

 Alnwick castle, in 1567, the glass was ordered 

 to be taken out and laid up in safety, when 

 the lord was absent !" The people lived mainly 

 upon salt meat, none but the clergy and nobility 

 wore linen, and so careful were those who had 

 it, that night-clothes were never worn ! The 

 household furniture among the wealthy families 

 of Colchester, consisted of an occasional bed, 

 a brass pot, a brass cup, a gridiron, and a 

 mg or two, and perhaps a towel. Of chairs 

 and tables we hear nothing. That was in 1301. 

 Queen Elizabeth's palace, had few, if any, 

 glass windows. As late as the reign of Henry 

 VIII. it was said that "the nastiness of the peo- 

 ple was the cause of the frequent plagues that 

 destroyed them ; that their floors were com- 

 monly of clay, strewed with rushes, under 

 which lay unmolested a collection of beer, 

 grease, fragments, bones, spittle, excrements 

 of dogs and cats, and of everything that is nau- 

 seous !" 



Now, brother farmers, contrast, fii'st, the 

 laws under which they lived, and these under 

 which we live, and then their tools and ma- 

 chinery with ours, and their cabins and wretch- 

 ed clothing and furniture, with those common 

 among us, and you cannot fail to be more con- 

 tented and happy than ever with your New 

 England homes and farms. 



MARKETING- "WOOL. 

 After a preamble which sets forth certain 

 "rules" which have been adopted by "Wool 

 Buyers' Conventions," some of which have gone 

 so far as to require an effort to be made to ob- 

 tain a list of such purchasing agents as disregard 

 them, to the end that they may be discounte- 

 nanced, and thus thrown out of business, — the 

 following resolutions were adopted by the New 

 York State Sheep Breeders' and Wool Grow- 

 ers' Association, at their Fair at Auburn, May 

 10th. They were adopted unanimously, after 

 a full discussion, by an assemblage of men ex- 

 hibiting, as the Utica Herald remarks, in its 

 appearance and evincing in its action, more 

 intelligence and practical wisdom, greater 

 frankness and honesty of purpose, than is of- 

 ten gathered together. Among the gentlemen 



present were Mr. Edwin Hammond, the 

 famous Vermont sheep breeder, Mr. Sanford, 

 of the same State, Mr. King, of Dutchess 

 county, the breeder of Cotswolds, Mr. Holmes, 

 of Washington, Hon. Mr. Pottle, of Ontario, 

 Judge Ketchum, of Wayne, and others, repre- 

 senting about every section of the State of 

 New York. 



Our own recollection of the coldness of the 

 mountain streams in which we washed sheep 

 in our younger days, and of the colds, rheu- 

 matism and fevers which were clearly tracea- 

 ble to such exposure, often incurred when in 

 a profuse perspiration from the chasing neces- 

 sary to drive the sheep from the pasture to the 

 brook, leads us to wonder that in discussions 

 of the expediency of washing, so little is said 

 of the injurious effect of this practice on the 

 health and life of the men who perform the op- 

 eration. 



Resolved, That sheep should be guarded as far as 

 practicable from an admixture of hay, straw, this- 

 tles, burs, or other like extraneous substances, 

 with their wool. 



Resolved. That washing sheep in running streams, 

 in season to shear them at the proper time in the 

 spring, is often dangerous by reason of the cold- 

 ness of the water, especially in regions where the 

 streams descend from mountains or highlands ; 

 thiit it is not conveniently practicaltic in other re- 

 gions, on account of the remoteness of running 

 streams ; that in many localities the prevalence of 

 contageous diseases, like scab and hoof rot, ren- 

 der it unsafe to take a sound sheep to any of the 

 convenient washing places ; that the natural yolk 

 or "gi-ease" if left in the sheared wool docs not in- 

 jure it in any respect for keeping or manufactur- 

 ing ; that the greatest portion of the wool grown 

 in the world is and always has been shorn and sold 

 unwashed, without objection from any quarter; 

 that we possess certain information that many of 

 the largest wool manufacturers in the United 

 States are willing, and a large number of them 

 prefer, to have American wool lirought to market 

 unwashed; and that accordingly wc recommend 

 the wool growers of the country to consult their 

 own convenience and inclinations in this matter. 



Resolved, That the length of time which should 

 elapse between washing and shearing cannot be 

 determined properly by the number of days, but 

 it should also be regulated by the state of the 

 weather ; that wool should not be shorn after wash- 

 ing until it has acquired its characteristic glossy 

 look and soft feeling. 



Resolved, That wool is not injured in the least 

 degree for n manufacturing by being done up as 

 tightly as practicable ; that, however, wlicn done 

 up extremely tight and then pressed together by 

 its own weight in large masses, the difficulty of 

 separating it by the sorter is increased ; that there 

 is no danger of producing this effect by any ordi- 

 nary application of strength, when the fleece is 

 folded and tied by hand, but that it may be 

 prot-Uiccd, especially in the case of greasy wools, 

 in wool presses ; that the twine used for tying 

 should not be unnecessarily large, or used in un- 

 necessary quantities, and should be of such tex- 

 ture that particles of it will not become incorpo- 

 rated with the wool. 



