64 
THE SHEEP. 
THE OLDER LONG-WOOLLED BREEDS OF THE INLAND' DISTRICTS. 
ward, and another was found more to the north stretching to the river Parret in Somersetshire. The first of these varieties, termed 
Southham Notts, had brown faces and legs, crooked limbs, and flat sides. They carried a fleece of long wool, moderately soft, 
weighing from 9 lb. to 10 lb., and at 30 months old the wethers weighed from 22 lb. to 25 lb. the quarter. The other variety was 
termed Bampton Notts, from the village of that name on the confines of the counties of Devon and Somerset. They had white 
faces, bore a very weighty fleece of long wool, and weighed at two years old from 30 lb. to 35 lb. the quarter. These breeds have 
been largely crossed with the New Leicester, and may be said to be now extinct in their pure state. The first mixture of blood 
produced at once animals greatly superior to the older race. The defect of these sheep was their clumsy forms and thick hides, 
and consequent indisposition to fatten. These faults have been entirely corrected by the crossing that has taken place, although 
this was more tardily carried into effect in Devonshire than in any other part of England; and on the basis of the older breeds 
has been formed a very fine race of sheep, diminished in bulk of body from the original Bamptons, but still amongst the largest 
sheep in the kingdom. Thus a wether of mixed blood, killed in 1835, had arrived at the prodigious weight of 70 lb. the quarter; 
and one lately living in the neighbourhood of Exeter weighed 430 lb. live weight. The breeders of Devonshire take a just pride 
in their newly-formed breed, but do not seem disposed to reduce the size to the standard approved of by the Leicester breeders. 
Crossing the Irish Channel, we find a country abounding in Long-woolled Sheep. Ireland, from the fertility of the soil, the 
humidity of the climate, and the mildness of the winters, is well suited for the rearing of Sheep of the larger kind; and Sheep 
appear, in every known period, to have existed in numbers throughout the country. They consisted partly of short-woolled breeds, 
to which reference has been already made, and partly of a long-woolled race, which extended with pretty uniform characters 
over the greater part of the level country. This latter race was of large size, and of a form peculiarly coarse and unthrifty. 
They are described by Mr Culley as they were seen by him at the fair of Ballinasloe, in the latter part of last century, thus :— 
“ I am sorry to say I never saw such ill-formed ugly sheep as these : the worst breeds we have in Great Britain are much supe¬ 
rior. One would almost imagine that the sheep-breeders in Ireland have taken as much pains to breed plain awkward sheep, as 
many of the people in England have to breed handsome ones. I know nothing to recommend them except their size, which 
might please some old-fashioned breeders, who can get no kind of stock large enough. But I will endeavour to describe them, and 
leave my readers to judge for themselves. These sheep are supported by long, thick, crooked and grey legs; their heads long 
and ugly, with large flagging ears, grey faces, and eyes sunk, necks long, and set on below the shoulders; breasts narrow and 
short, hollow before and behind the shoulders; flat-sided, with high narrow herring backs; hind quarters drooping, and tail set 
low. In short, they are almost in every respect contrary to what I apprehend a well-formed sheep should be.’** Of the fidelity 
of this description no doubt can be entertained, although the change that has since taken place is so great as to leave little likeness 
of the former picture. There yet remain, indeed, some of the distinctive characters of the older family,—the large heads, the flat 
sides, the narrow breasts ; but all that excessive ugliness of form which placed the Irish below the worst breeds of England, may 
be said to have disappeared. This has been the result of crossing with the New Leicester Breed, which began about the time Mr 
Culley wrote, and has been continued since with such success that it is now difficult to find an individual of the unmixed race 
in the whole country. Many of the wealthier breeders acquired at once flocks of the pure New Leicester Breed, but the main 
effect was produced by crossing, which everywhere took place with a rapidity which may well be deemed remarkable in a country 
where so defective a state of property exists, and where so many obstacles counteract the natural course of improvement. 
But the present Long-woolled Sheep of Ireland still want much of the perfection at which they are capable of arriving. They 
are yet, for the most part, too coarse in their general form, narrow in the chest, and flat-sided. The wool is only of medium 
quality and weight: there is a sort of harshness about it, which shows that the long wool of Ireland was never of good quality. 
The breed is more valued by the butcher in its present state than when more highly improved; but there is manifestly too great 
a proportion of waste for the profit of the breeder, and it does not appear that the mutton is superior to that of the New Leices- 
ters. It is the fear of many breeders in Ireland, that the system of crossing has been carried too far, and that the Sheep of the 
country are becoming too small. The same fear was entertained by the owners of the Teeswater, the Romney Marsh, and other 
long-woolled Sheep of England, when the Leicester blood was first introduced. But time allayed these misapprehensions, at least 
to the extent to which they were at first excited ; and although in many districts of England the breeders seem now disposed to 
resist the further change of their stock by crossing, this was not until after a larger infusion of the blood of the new breed than 
has yet taken place in the great mass of the long-woolled Sheep of Ireland, which certainly cannot be said to have yet arrived at a 
degree of refinement injurious to their useful qualities. They have still, for the most part, too great length of limbs with rela¬ 
tion to the depth of carcass, and their apparent bulk of body may yet be materially lessened without diminution of the weight. 
* Culley on Live Stock. 
