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breeding merino flocks. Mr. Sheppard has written a very 
long, and a very judicious letter to Sir John Sinclair on the 
subject of his experiments : and though he is a great advo¬ 
cate for the propagation of the Spanish breed, and for cross¬ 
ing with it the native fine-wooled breeds, he explicitly ac¬ 
knowledges the deterioration. u I have before me/’ says 
he, “ large samples of the wool of my first crosses from Lord 
Bathurst’s ram with my Ryeland ewes, shorn in 1802 , and 
of the wool from the same sheep, shorn in the present year 
( 1806 .) The quality of the wool in the course of that time 
has so much degenerated that I should conceive the lapse 
of a similar period would reduce it to the coarseness of the 
original stock.” He further adds, “ I have found also the 
wool of his Majesty’s ram much degenerated, from the com¬ 
parison of specimens in 1803 , and the present year” ( 1806 .) 
—All the manufacturing gentlemen with whom I conversed 
concurred in the opinion, that crossing the merino with the 
line wooled breeds of England would greatly improve the 
fleeces of those breeds, but they also generally agreed that 
it was impossible to preserve the merino fleece in such per¬ 
fection there, as to supercede the necessity of importations 
of foreign wool. 
Reasoning a priori, we should be led to the same conclu¬ 
sions which these opinions seem to warrant. The extreme 
humidity of the climate, and the rankness and sourness of 
vegetation consequent upon it, might be expected to give a 
laxness and coarseness to the texture of the skin, and a lank¬ 
ness and coarseness to the fibre of the wool. If I mistake 
not, the effect of a damp, foggy climate upon the texture of 
skin is observable in that country even in the human species. 
Though the English are distinguished for symmetry of fea¬ 
tures, and their florid complexions, yet we rarely observe 
that smoothness and firmness in the tissue of the skin, 
resembling the polish of ivory, which is so common in this 
country. If this be the case with the human species, much 
more must it be so with the brute creation which is so con¬ 
stantly exposed to the effects of the climate. 
