MERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
FOR THE 
TTarm, GrarcLen, and. UAonseliold. 
i “AGKIOULTUKE 18 THE MOST HEALTHFUL, MOST USEFUL, AN1> .MOST NOltLE EMPLOYMENT OF M AN.”-WismNaTON. 
. 
ORANGE JUDD COMPANY,) ESTABLISHED IN 1842. ( TERMS : $1.50 per Annum in Advance, post-free; 
Publishers and Proprietors, £45 Broadway. ) German Edition issued at the same rates as in English. I Four Copies $5.—Single Number, 15 Cents. 
NEW SERIES—No. 389. 
VOLUME XXXVIII.—No. 6. 
Drawn and Engraved for the American Agriculturist. 
Much has been said and written in recent years 
about the preservation or the growth of trees. 
They have generally been looked upon as some¬ 
thing to be cut down and destroyed—as useless, if 
not injurious, because taking the place of some¬ 
thing that might grow with profit. But trees have 
their value as shade even in the pasture usually 
given up to grass. A few spreading trees render 
the field attractive to the beholder, or should do so, 
"whether he be the owner or merely a passer by. 
The comfort of the animals resting and ruminating 
under the cool shade is too apparent to be disputed, 
and the flowing pail at night in the dairy, or the 
•vigorous and playful flock, betoken the intrinsic 
value of the shade which has sheltered them from 
the heat of the mid-day sun. The agreeable scene 
pictured above could hardly be seen in an American 
landscape, unless it might be in the blue-grass re¬ 
gions of Kentucky, where one may occasionally find 
a picturesque grove of broad speading trees on the 
rolling meadows of that far-famed locality, under 
"Which flocks of choice sheep or herds of magnifi¬ 
cent Shorthorns rest themselves or graze content¬ 
edly. The view above is by a European artist, and 
represents a flock of French Merino sheep under 
the care of a shepherd, in a finely shaded pasture. 
It recalls the history of those times when a small 
flock of thoroughbred Merinos represented a small 
fortune to the owner or the purchaser, and when a 
ram was considered worth several thousand dol¬ 
lars, and a ewe only a little less ; and when the un¬ 
fortunate owner of a flock fed with it by day and 
6lept with it at night. It can scarcely be said that 
those were extravagant days, when we consider 
what has resulted from the popular appreciation of 
the merits of those valuable sheep from which the 
American Merino has descended, and which are 
represented in the above picture. Our American 
Merinos partake more of the character of the French 
than of the Spanish prototypes. The heavy, deep 
bodies, the wrinkled necks, the thickly wooled bel¬ 
lies and legs covered to the hoofs, mark the French 
rather than the Spanish type, and as the popular 
demand for longer wool than that of the extremely 
small sheep, and the extra gain in the way of mut¬ 
ton in the carcass of the larger, long-wool Merinos, 
secure greater profit, so the present improved 
American Merino would be well represented by 
this foreign picture. And it is certainly desirable 
that the comfortable scene above may have the 
useful effect of encouraging a taste for shaded 
pastures, in place pf the too frequent bare, un¬ 
sheltered fields in which sheep pant and suffer from 
intolerable heat under the shady side of a rail 
fence, forced to content themselves with that make- 
believe shelter from the sun’s rays, which prevent 
feeding and the possibility of comfortable rest. 
If shade in the pastures is desirable in the cooler 
climate of Europe, how much more is it needed 
here, where the sun has so much greater force. 
Aside from the question of humanity, which should 
of itself be sufficient to induce us to provide for 
the comfort of our animals, that of profit is con¬ 
cerned. It can not be expected that animals will 
thrive under conditions which their owner would 
find almost intolerable. Let the animals have shade. 
COPYRIGHT, 1879, BY ©RANGE JlTDD COMPANY. 
