FINE WOOL SHEEP HUSBANDRY. 137 
The sheep which are to be sold are usually sheared 
about the first of May, and some of them earlier. 
If a number of sheep were selected from the same 
flock so closely resembling each other, that if divided 
into two parcels one could scarcely choose between 
them, and then if one of these parcels were treated ag 
above described, and the other in the ordinary way; 
that is to say, if the latter were wholly unhoused 
except in winter, and not sheared until near the first 
of July, no inexperienced person who should examine 
the two parcels in the ensuing fall or winter, could be 
made to believe they were sheep of the same quality. 
Explain to him fully the difference in their treatment, 
and still the effect produced upon his eyes would so 
far control his judgment that he would pay twice as 
much for the housed and early sheared sheep. 
The leading breeders of Vermont are guilty of no 
deception in these particulars, for they frankly avow 
their treatment and their motives for it. And they 
might ask if it is not as legitimate to put a sheep as a 
horse or any other piece of property in its best form 
for sale. 
But it is undeniable that the practices named lead 
to many disappointments. The buyer never finds his 
sheep looking so dark-colored again, and he is aston- 
ished sometimes to find that after he has sheared them 
once, these supposed, prodigies are no “ woolier” than 
sheep he owned before. Besides, the sheep which has 
been carefully housed from storms all its life does not 
always do so well when exposed to them. 
Tt costs no trifling sum to house sheep in the sum- 
mer. On a large establishment, and with flocks 
scattered in distant fields, the expense and trouble 
