110 Sheep-Farming 



ewes, which is, of course, given for the benefit of 

 the lambs." 



These accounts make it evident that cross-breed- 

 ing was the first source of improvement, while the 

 second and most infiuential source was the high feed- 

 ing and culture that followed the breeding operations. 



Extent of the Hampshire improvement. — In a 

 prize essay written in 1847, Robert Smith says : 

 "The Hampshire Downs were originally very large 

 and coarse, but of late years they have been im- 

 proved by an admixture of the Sussex Down; still, 

 however, they retain an extra degree of size, bone, 

 and fieece to any other, and are easily distinguished 

 by those characteristics. Breeders who prefer strong 

 sheep consider this variety better than any other 

 for enduring hardships and for general purposes." 

 Writing a few years later, 1855, another authority 

 states: "This rapidly increasing breed of sheep ap- 

 pears to be the result of a recent cross between the 

 pure Southdown and the old horned white-face sheep 

 of Hampshire and Wiltshire, by which the hard- 

 working though fine quality of the former is combined 

 with the superior size and constitution of the latter. 

 The breed was commenced at the early part of the 

 present century and, by a judicious crossing, now pos- 

 sesses the leading characteristics of the two parent 

 breeds. Their leading characteristics, as compared 

 with the Southdowns, are increased size, equal ma- 

 turity, and a hardier constitution." A few years 



