CHAPTER V. 



BEITISH AKD OTHEE LONG AND MIDDLE- WOOLED 

 SHEEP IN THE UNITED STATES. 



LEICBSTEES, COTSWOLDS, LINCOLNS, NEW OXFOEDSHIEBS, 

 BLACK-FACED SCOTCH, CHEVIOT, FAT-ETJMPED, BEOAD-TAILED, 

 PEESIAN ANX> CHUfESE SHEEP. 



No breed of domestic sheep were indigenous to the United 

 States ; nor is it deemed necessary here to attempt to trace 

 the origin or subsequent history of the various breeds and 

 families, imported by our ancestors when they colonized this 

 Continent, and which, being mixed promiscuously together, 

 constituted what it became customary to speak of as the 

 " Native Sheep," when the Merino and the improved British 

 breeds were afterwards introduced. They were generally 

 lank, gaunt, slow -feeding, coarse, short-wooled, hardy, 

 prolific animals — not well adapted to any special purpose of 

 wool or mutton production. A family of. them, the Otter 

 Sheep — so termed from their short, crooked, rickety legs, a 

 mere perpetuated monstrosity — and the descendants of some 

 English long-wools, on Smith's Island, imagined by a few 

 persons to be indigenous there — are the only sub-varieties 

 which have ever attracted special notice; and they were 

 wholly unworthy of it. 



Not having bred English sheep of late years, and never 

 having bred them extensively, I can entertain little doubt that 

 I shall give more satisfaction to the readers of this volume if 

 I select descriptions of them from British and American 

 sources of recognized authority. 



The Leicestee Sheep.* — ^It is with profound pleasure that 

 I am enabled to trace the first probable importation into the 



* I leave off the prefli "New," becanae these sheep have altogether superseded 

 the parent stock, bo as to be generally denominated " the Leicester." And they are 

 so denominated in the prize lists of the Boyal Agriooltnral Society of England. 



