VARIOUS BREEDS OF SHEEP IN GREAT BRITAIN. 587 
cultivation, and the enlarged area of sheep- farming of the 
present day. 
The new Leicester is now perhaps the most widely extended 
and most numerous of all our native breeds. The sheep are 
without horns, with white faces and legs ; the head small 
and clean ; the eye bright ; neck and shoulders square and 
deep; back straight, with deep carcase; hind quarters taper- 
ing towards the tail and somewhat deficient when compared 
with the Cotswold sheep ; legs clean, with fine bone. The 
flesh is juicy, but of moderate quality, and is remarkable for 
the proportion of outside fat it carries. 
They are not considered so hardy as the other large breeds, 
and require shelter and good keep. The ewes are neither 
very prolific nor good mothers, and the young lambs require 
great attention. Early maturity and aptitude for fattening 
are the principal characteristics of the breed, a large propor- 
tion of the wethers finding their way to market at twelve or 
fifteen months old, and weighing from 80 to 1001b. each; 
at two years old they average 120 to 1501b. each. The wool 
is a valuable portion of the flock, the fleece averaging 7lb. 
each. 
The occasional introduction of a little Cotswold blood into 
a Leicester flock has the effect of improving both the con- 
stitution of the animal and also the hind-quarters, in which 
theLeicester is somewhat defective. Ram-breeding is carried 
out to a much larger extent with this breed than with any 
other. 
Cotswolds . — The Oolite hills running from north-east to 
south-west, and occupying the eastern division of Glou- 
cestershire, have given their name to a breed of sheep, which 
probably is one of the oldest recorded native breeds of 
the country, and which, owing to recent improvements, is 
now rapidly increasing in public estimation. Mention is 
made of them in history in the early part of the fifteenth 
century; and in 1467, according to Stow, certain of these 
sheep were by permission of the king, Edward IY, exported 
to Spain, At that period, and for more than two centuries 
afterwards, the range of the Cotswold Hills formed broad, 
uninclosed, and bleak tracts of country, affording no natural 
shelter, but covered with a short sweet herbage. The Cots- 
wold sheep of that day, though possessing the type of the 
present breed, were, judging from the country they occu- 
pied, probably very different from them in size and general 
external appearance. This question has been disputed by 
many writers: the result seems to be that there are no 
physiological reasons nor agricultural facts to disturb the 
