86 FINE WOOL SILEEP HUSBANDRY. 
colored, while the oil or gum of the Spanish Merino 
is so adhesive and sticky it is difficult, and in many 
of them impossible, to wash it out of their wool by 
ordinary brook-washing ; and as it is the yolk or oily 
matter contained in the fleece, causing the dust and 
other matter to adhere to it, which gives the external 
color, the Spanish Merinos are generally darker on the 
surface than the French, and it is this excess of oil in 
the Spanish Merino which causes their fleeces to luse 
so large a percentage in weight when cleansed for 
manutacturers’ use. Experiments made with the two 
kinds of wool, by reliable and experienced manufac- 
turers have proved that as much cloth can be made of 
the same number of pounds of unwashed French 
Merino wool as can be made of an equal number of 
pounds of brook-washed Spanish Merino wool in the 
condition it is usually sold. 
‘In answer to your inquiry as to the color of the 
wool of the French sheep when opened on the back, 
and if their oil is white or yellow, I would say their 
wool is generally of a cream-color, or has a yellowish 
cast, and the oil or yolk in their fleece is a similar 
color ; still, when washed, their wool is of a pure 
white. 
“The wool of some of the French sheep is naturally 
quite white when opened on the body, without being 
washed ; but I have invariably found those having the 
whitish wool (when alike in other respects) were the 
lightest shearers.’’* 
The following statement of E. L. Gage, of De 
Ruyter, N. Y. (made in behalf of his father and 
himself}, contains interesting details in respect to the 
management of these sheep, by persons whose skill 
and success in that particular have not been ex- 
celled ; 
* This letter is dated January 11, 1862, 
