a a 
186 
in most other breeds of sheep, and being abund- 
ant in yolk, is covered with a dirty crust, often 
full of cracks. The legs are long, yet small in 
the bone; the breast and the back are narrow, 
and the sides somewhat flat; the foreshoulders 
and bosoms are heavy, and too much of their 
weight is carried on the coarser parts. The 
horns of the male are comparatively large, curved, 
and with more or less of a spiral form. The head 
is large, but the forehead rather low. A few of 
the females are horned, but, generally speaking, 
they are without horns. Both male and female 
have a peculiar coarse and unsightly growth of 
hair on the forehead and cheeks, which the care- 
ful flock-master cuts away before shearing time; 
the other part of the face has a pleasing and 
characteristic velvet appearance. Under the 
throat there is a singular looseness of skin which 
gives them a remarkable appearance of throati- 
ness or hollowness in the pile; the pile when 
pressed upon is hard and unyielding; it is so 
from the thickness with which it grows upon the 
pelt, and the abundance of the yolk detaining all 
the dirt and gravel which fall upon it; but 
when examined, the fibre exceeds in fineness, and 
in the number of serrations and curves, that 
which any other sheep in the world produces. 
The average weight of the fleece in Spain is 8 
pounds from the ram and 5 from the ewe ; when 
fatted, these sheep weigh from 12 to 16 pounds 
per quarter.” But, on the other hand, the 
Merinos have very serious defects. “When we 
regard them as animals to be fattened for human 
food,” says Professor Low, “they are of an in- 
ferior class. Their flesh is of indifferent quality, 
and they are of tender constitutions. The females 
are the worst nurses of any race of sheep which 
inhabit Europe. So great is their defect in this 
respect, that in Spain half the lambs are killed 
in order that the ewes may be enabled to suckle 
the remainder, it being calculated by the Span- 
ish shepherds that the milk of two ewes is re- 
quired to bring up one lamb in a proper manner. 
Abortions are frequent, parturition is difficult, 
and the ewes are more apt to desert their off- 
spring than any other sheep which are known to 
us. In these respects, the Merinos resemble the 
ancient Oves molles of Italy, which were remark- 
able for the delicacy of their constitution, their 
voracity, unthriftiness, and inferior power of se- 
creting milk. The Spanish Merinos, although 
retaining a certain degree of wildness, are yet 
very docile in their tempers. No sheep place 
themselves more unreservedly under the guid- 
ance of the shepherds ; and, although late in ar- 
riving at maturity, and difficult to be fattened, 
they are readily satisfied with dry and innutri- 
tious pastures, When put amongst other sheep, 
they keep together, generally on the higher 
grounds. At night they form themselves into 
a circle, the rams and stronger sheep being on 
the outside, retaining thus the’ instincts which 
they had acquired in their native habita- 
SHEEP. 
tion.” The Merino breed were introduced to 
Britain in 1788, and pushed into prominent no- 
tice among British farmers in 1804, and taken 
under the special protection of a great and influ- 
ential public society, instituted for the purpose, 
in 1811; and they have, in a great diversity of 
places and circumstances, both by themselves 
and by intermixture with other breeds, been put 
to a very ample trial in our country. All the 
crosses from them, however, have either so to- 
tally failed or been so excessively diluted, that 
they may already be regarded as quite extinct; 
and though the pure naturalized Merinos have 
entirely succeeded, and are found to improve in 
size, in lactiferousness, in length of wool, and in 
external form, yet they are not hardy enough for 
all ordinary situations, and do not yield so much 
profit to the farmer as some of the best British 
breeds. 
The French sheep, commonly called Mouton de 
Picardie, de Brie, de Beauce, are of medium dimen- 
sions, and measure about 2 feet 4 inches (French) 
in height at the shoulder. The rams are usually 
hornless, the head narrow, and, in common with 
a portion of the neck and legs, covered with a 
short, rough, hairy coating. The wool of the body 
is coarse and abundant, and hangs in large se- 
parate masses, composed of straight untwisted 
filaments. The usual colour is white. The 
French writers distinguish several varieties, or 
mixed races, which, like our own, commonly bear 
the name of the district of which they are the most 
characteristic. La Flandrine is long and tall, 
and is supposed to have originated from a cross 
by an African ram; it is also called mouton de 
Texel. La Solognote has a fine slender head, 
usually hornless, and the wool frizzled at the ex- 
tremity of the meshes only. La Berichonne is 
distinguished by the length of its neck. The 
head is without horns, and furnished with wool 
on its summit. The fleece is fine, white, short, 
close, and frizzled. La Roussillonaise produces a 
very fine wool, which partakes of the nature of 
the Spanish fleeces, being spirally twisted in a 
similar manner. It has probably been crossed 
with the Merino race. There are many demi- 
merinos in France; and of these the wool is 
usually longer, though less fine, than that of the 
true Spanish breeds. 
The British breeds of sheep have been classed 
into horned and hornless, into long-woolled and 
short-woolled, into upland and lowland, into an- 
cient and modern, and into natural and cross. 
But they may, much more fully and with far 
greater advantage, be distributed into the Scot- 
tish Insular, the Welsh, the Irish, the English 
forest, the old upland, the mountain, the down, 
and the long-woolled. According to this classifi- 
cation, the Scottish Insular breeds comprise the 
Shetland and the Hebridean; the Welsh breeds 
comprise the mountain Welsh, the soft-woolled 
Welsh, and the Radnor: the Irish breeds com- 
prise the Wicklow, the Kerry, and the long- 
