THE SHEEP. 
185 
Nature has given to the sheep, as well as to other animals, an instinct- 
ive and strong affection for its young; an affection which strengthens 
in proportion to the necessities of the parent and the offspring. The 
more inhospitable the land is on which they feed, the greater their 
kindness and attention to their little ones; nevertheless, it will occasion- 
ally happen that the young ewe, in the pain and confusion and fright 
of her first parturition, abandons her lamb. Some, when the udder 
begins to fill, will search it out again, and with unerring precision — 
others, severed from their offspring before they had become acquainted 
with its form and scent, are eagerly searching for it all over the field 
with incessant and piteous bleatings. Some will be hanging over their 
dead offspring, while a few, strangely forgetting that they are mothers, 
are grazing unconcernedly with the rest of the flock. 
There is another circumstance that adds to the confusion. Some of 
the ewes have had twins ; they have inadvertently strayed from one of 
them, or stupidly or capriciously have driven it from them ; and the 
neglected one is wandering about, vainly seeking its parent, or angrily 
repulsed by it. 
The first thing a lamber has to do is to remedy as well as he can this 
confusion. He first seeks out for those that have twins, and that have 
recognized both of their lambs, and, taking his little marking-bottle and 
marking-iron, he puts a particular mark on each of the twins, by which 
he may again recognize them, and on each pair he puts a different mark. 
If they are just dropped, and are weak, he leaves them for a while; 
but if they are able to travel a little, he drives them into a pound, or 
into a corner of the field with the other twins, or he at once removes 
them into another and somewhat better pasture, which he had destined 
for the twins. 
He then looks for the lambs that have apparently been abandoned by 
the mother, and if, as he takes one of them up, it bleats, he will pres- 
ently find whether there is any responsive call or gaze of recognition. 
If the mother eagerly calls to it, he has but to put it down, and she 
will speedily rejoin and suckle it, if it is strong enough to raise itself 
from the ground for this purpose. If the animal is almost exhausted, 
he must catch the ewe, and assist her to suckle the lamb. It will soon 
revive, and her love for it will revive too. If she merely gives a care- 
less look of recognition, he must suckle the lamb from his bottle of 
ewe’s milk, and leave it for a while ; perhaps her affection will return 
when her udder begins to be distended with milk; if not, he must drive 
her with others into a fold, and, suffering the rest to escape, try every 
means to induce her to let the little one suck. There may be consider- 
able difficulty in this at first, but, by the exercise of some patience and 
tact, he will generally succeed. After all, however, he will probably 
have some lambs upon his hands for whom he cannot find a mother, or 
whose own mother will not suckle them. 
On the other hand, he will find some ewes who are gazing mournfully 
on their dead lambs. With some contrivance, he will generally find 
m these foster-mothers for his abandoned ones. He ties a piece of 
cord round the hind feet of a dead lamb, and the mother, if she has 
not been unnecessarily frightened by the lamber, or his dog, will follow 
