310 Wool in Relation to Science with Practice. 
American cousins : on some parts of the Continent the know- 
ledge of wool is educationally treated as an important branch of 
science. Mr. Darwin tells us : — Lord Somerville, speaking of 
what breeders have done for sheep, says : — " it would seem as 
if they had chalked out upon a wall a form perfect in itself, and 
had then given it existence."* In Saxony the importance of the 
principle of selection in regard to Merinos is so fully recognised, 
that men follow it as a trade : the sheep are placed on a table 
and are studied, like a picture by a connoisseur ; this is done . 
three times, at intervals of months, and the sheep are each time 
marked and classed, so that the best may be selected for breeding. 
]\Iy object is thoroughly practical : I have lived, farmed, and 
observed for twenty-five years in a district in which the wool 
is famous ; f but I claim no authority of my own : it has 
been well said that " the knowledge of smatterers is but mixed 
ignorance." J I do, however, claim that I have gathered and put 
together much important and authoritative information, and some 
other matter that is calculated to excite curiosity and to suggest 
inquir}-. In the words of the Ettrick Shepherd — " the subject 
has almost made a sheepfold of our understanding." 
At the outset, I must ask the reader to bear in mind through- 
out this inquirv, that however much I may digress — and, 
amongst other things, I must make a flying visit to the flocks 
of the world, and especially to our most distant colonies — I shall 
always return to the main channel of my indicated course, which 
leads directly to the solution of two very practical questions : 
(1) Does the English farmer now prepare his wool for market to 
the best advantage ? (2) And if not, where practically shall we 
find the farmer's shortcomings? 
The Wool of the World, as exhibited at Paris at 1867, and at 
Vienna in 1873, I shall, to some extent, consider here as intro- 
ductory matter : I may have more to say when I come to 
treat the subject practically. At Paris, in 1867, the collection 
of wool from almost all parts of the world under one roof, 
rendered two facts very striking : the one, the absence of any 
adequate substitute for English deep-grown wools ; and the 
other, the slow rate of improvement in those wools of foreign 
growth, which are used in aid of the lower qualities of English 
combing-wool. 
American Opinion. — Our American cousin, to whom I have pre- 
viously referred, is keenly alive to the importance of " fine wool 
husbandry," although he is not yet awake to the advantages of free- 
trade : there have hmg been in the United States National and 
State Wool-Growers' Associations : the Government Department 
of Agriculture consults these Associations, and I need scarcely 
• Darwin's 'Origin of Species.' t See p. 320. % Lord Chief Justice Coke. 
