Report on the Agriculture of Belfjium. 
57 
ox has, say, in round numbers, about 50 lbs. of beetroot-pulp and 
51bs. of cake per diem, and this quantity will, therefore, be con^ 
sidered a sufficient daily allowance for ten feeding sheep. As an 
example of the system adopted, we cannot do better than describe 
the practice of M. Dumont, of Chassart, whose farm we have 
already mentioned. That gentleman buys sheep in different 
parts of Germany, preferring a cross of Merino with Southdown^ 
Most of them come half-fat Irom the Polish frontier, between two 
and three years old, and they are fed off in between two and three 
months, according to the season. Generally from 1400 to 1500 
are on the farm at one time. Those bought in the spring, when 
clover is scarce, get about half a pound of linseed-cake each per 
diem on pastures ; then the clover, consisting of rye -grass and 
white Dutch, yields abundance of food until the end of September, 
when it is assisted, until the beginning of November, by tops and 
leaves of beetroots. About the end of November " house-feeding " 
commences in the " bergeries," the food consisting entirely of 
beetroot-pulp, which they eat widi avidity. All the lots are 
finished off with a little cake just before they are fit for market. 
M. Dumont does not find his " house-fed " mutton so profitable 
as his beef; but he attributes this chiefly to the market being 
glutted with sheep during the later autumn and winter months^ 
Most of his sheep are sold for the Brussels or the English markets. 
The native sheep weigh heavier tlian the cross with an English 
breed ; but notwithstanding that fact, the latter will sell for more 
money, even to native butchers. In Belgium generally fat meat 
is not liked, and what is there considered " fat," would in England 
require a deal of feeding to make it fit for market ; but Merin» 
sheep never can be fattened, and the butcher, although he knows 
that he gets more weight, puts a tolerably accurate value on the 
overwhelming proportion of skin and bone. 
11. Pigs. — The true Belgian pigs have precisely those qualities 
which English breeders and feeders try to avoid. They are long- 
bodied, flat-sided, lop-eared, and very large animals, which look 
as if they had enormous appetites, but a small propensity to 
fatten. Of late years they have been in some districts much 
improved by crossing with English breeds. We complimented 
one proprietor-farmer on his possession of capital English pigs ; 
but his reply rather startled us. " The English races," he said, 
" are the best in the world, and the easiest to fatten ; but they are 
the very worst of all for the farmer." This seemed to us a para- 
dox, and we asked for an explanation, which was thus rendered :. 
Iietween two and three months, and that of a breeding ewe which has to be kept 
all the year round. These and other differences between sheep- farming in England 
and sheep-keeping in Belgium will strike the agricultural reader more forcibly in, 
a later portion of this Report. 
