Farming of Lincolnshire. 



393 



corn is covered with less in the roof; and the thatch is much 

 safer from wind than upon the ricks with high-pointed gables. 



In the Isle of Axholme is found another type (fig. 3), partaking 

 probably more of the picturesque than the profitable. 



Fig. 2. Fig. 3. 



5. The suitability or otherwise of the present Long-woolled breed 

 of Sheep to the ranges of light 2\irnip Land in the County. 



In considering the next subject proposed by the Society, it will 

 be advisable to state first, in a few words, what the Lincolnshire 

 sheep really are. The old Lincolnshire long-wools were ungainly 

 animals, with a carcass long and thin, legs thick and rough, bones 

 large, pelts thick ; and though attaining to a great weight they 

 were a very long time in arriving at maturity ; in fact their chief 

 merit was their wool, from 8 to 16 inches long, and weighing 

 from 8 to 14 lbs. per fleece; and this wool formerly made the 

 breed profitable to the lowland graziers although covering a slow- 

 feeding, coarse-grained carcass of mutton. Upwards of 50 years 

 ago, when Young wrote his ^ Survey,' the New Leicesters were 

 spreading very rapidly over the county, probably faster than they 

 had done (with one or two exceptions) in any other, driving out 

 the Lincolns from the poorer lands and improving them by cross- 

 ing. ''The true Lincoln," he says, "is a larger sheep and with 

 a longer wool, and therefore demands better pasturage ; where it 

 finds such, there the old breed remains. Upon inferior land the 

 Leicester establishes itself, from the necessity of having smaller 

 size and shorter wool." At the present time the pure old- 

 fashioned Lincolns are scarcely to be found, except in some few 

 places in the south-eastern lowland and the rich eastern marshes. 

 The improved Lincoln and Leicester sheep universally prevail, 

 varying widely, however, in different districts ; and while perusing 

 the following characteristics, the reader must remember that 

 prejudice for one's own is as firmly rooted in this as in many 

 other counties. The larger breeds chiefly occupy the south- 

 eastern quarter of the county, and are known as "the Lincoln- 

 shire Long-wools," in contradistinction to the Cotswold and im- 



