THE CHEVIOT BREED. 
PLATE VIII. 
EWE, Bred by Mr Thomson, Attonburn, County of Roxburgh. 
The Cheviot Breed of Sheep is derived from a district of trap, situated in the north of Northumberland, and extending into 
Scotland, forming the mountains termed Cheviot. These mountains are in contact with the rugged country of heath, which has 
been seen to be the habitat of the Black-faced Breed; but the true trap district is limited in extent, and differs greatly in its 
character from the heathy wastes adjoining. It is composed of a range of beautiful mountains tending to the conical, and mostly 
covered with grasses, ferns, wild thyme, and other plants distinctive of trap, often to the very summit. They are frequently 
in contact at their bases, or separated from one another by narrow valleys. While they pass on one side into the district of 
heaths, they are connected on the other with a rich cultivated country. Their highest summit is 2658 feet above the level of the 
sea, and they are frequently capped with snow long after it has disappeared from the lower grounds. 
This district has produced from time immemorial a race of Sheep entirely distinct in its characters from the Wild Heath 
Breed of the elevated moors adjoining. The Cheviot Sheep are destitute of horns in the male and female : their faces and legs are 
white, exceptions merely occurring in the case of individuals in which these parts are dun. The body is very closely covered with 
wool, which is short and sufficiently fine for the making of certain cloths. The two-shear wethers, when fat, may weigh, on a 
medium, from sixteen to eighteen pounds the quarter, though with great differences, dependent on the natural productiveness of the 
pastures, and the method of treatment when young. The ewes are usually reckoned to weigh from twelve to fourteen pounds the 
quarter. The mutton is very good, though inferior in delicacy to that of the Southdown and Welsh Sheep, and in flavour to that of 
the Black-faced Heath Breed. The natural form of the Sheep is, like that of all mountain breeds, with a light fore-quarter; but this 
character is removed by the effects of breeding, and the modern Cheviots are of good form. The body is somewhat longer than is 
usually the case with the Heath Breed, which has given rise to the popular distinction, in districts where both breeds are cultivated, 
of long and short Sheep. They are larger in the lower countries, where a supply of turnips can be given: they are lighter in the 
more elevated tracts, where artificial food is scanty, or wanting. The breeders adopt the kind of animal which is suited to the 
pastures, preferring a short-legged larger Sheep for the lower farms, and one of lighter and more agile form for the more upland 
and colder. The Cheviot Sheep are of quiet habits, possessing, indeed, the independence of a mountain race, but having none of 
the indocility which distinguishes some other races. They are exceedingly hardy, their close covering of fine wool enabling them 
to resist the extremes of cold. They feed more on the grasses, and less on the shoots of heath, than the Black-faced Breed, 
and hence they are less adapted to a country of entire heath, and require a larger range of pastures to support an equal number 
of animals. 
The Cheviot Sheep have spread from their native mountains to a large extent of country. They now cover a great part 
of the elevated moors from which the Black-faced Heath Sheep were derived. They have spread over the southern Highlands 
of Scotland, supplanting to a great extent the Heath Breed, which previously existed. They have been carried beyond the 
Grampians to the extreme north of Scotland, where they are reared in increasing numbers. To the late Sir John Sinclair is 
due the honour of having first carried them to the county of Caithness. But in some cases they have been placed in situations to 
which the coarser Heath Breed would have been better adapted, and many farmers, after experience of the effect, have reverted to 
the ancient race. The breed, however, has a greatly more extensive range than has yet been assigned to it; for it is evident that the 
Cheviot, like every breed of Sheep, has the property of adapting itself to the country in which it is naturalized. Thus the Sheep 
which are reared in the north of Scotland must give birth to a hardier race than is produced in the lower mountains of the south; 
and thus we may expect to see the range of the breed gradually extended, and narrowing the bounds occupied by the coarser 
Black-faced. The extension that has already taken place of this hardy breed, must be regarded as having been of singular benefit 
to breeders and the country. It has been recently carried to the west of England and Wales, and has every where been found 
suited to a cold and mountainous country. In its native country of the Cheviot Hills, it has been cultivated with great care by a 
class of breeders inferior to none in the kingdom for intelligence and enterprise ; and thus from every part of the kingdom breeders 
have the power of resorting to the native districts of the breed for the means of maintaining their stocks in a state of purity. 
G * 
