Ewes Neglecting their Lambs. 83 
escape. The value of a dog in giving warning of the enemy 
on dark and windy nights cannot be over estimated. Times 
out of number when I have been asleep the dog has roused 
me, and even then I have not been able to hear any move- 
ment among the sheep until I have got outside the hut, 
when his eagerness to dash off in pursuit of the enemy has 
proclaimed the unerring acuteness of his ear. The extreme 
nervousness of sheep in the Australian bush at night gives 
the native or the dingo the opportunity for attack, against 
which the shepherd must always be on his guard. On the 
approach of the enemy, they rush wildy in a dense body to 
the opposite side of the inclosure, running over each other’s 
backs, and crowding against the fence with great force. The 
next moment they are off to the opposite side, and so on, until 
some weak place is sure to yield to the repeated pressure. 
If this goes on for any considerable time, and the shepherd 
fails to hear it, he will wake up in the morning to find the 
fold empty, and must then trudge off to the head station to 
get help to collect the remnants of the scattered flock. He 
will not be likely to meet with acordial reception from the 
superintendent; and when, after three or four days, or a 
week even, the wreck of the flock is collected and counted, 
he may find that he has no wages to take fora year’s work, 
and is in debt to the squatter for a good round sum besides. 
Then he will wish that he had made a friend and companion 
of some sharp-eared dog to rouse him from that slumber 
which has proved so disastrous. 
In many other ways a dog may be most useful to a shepherd in 
a new country; for instance, in finding lambs which have been 
deserted by their mothers. How it may be in England I do not 
know from actual experience, but, so far as I can ascertain, the 
ewes here do not evince the singular indifference to the fate of 
their young which is one cause of serious loss to the sheep 
farmer in Australia and South America. In some cases, 
especially with highly-bred stock, nothing that the shepherd can 
do will persuade a ewe to take to her lamb and suckle it, 
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