right of pasturage for cattle and sheep. The native sheep of these ancient forests and commons presented distinctive characters and formed well-defined breeds. Several yet remain, and until late in the last century were quite numerous in Windsor Forest, Sherburne Forest. Mendip Forest, and many more, and were known as the Forest breeds. Most of these, however, are no longer to be recognized as separate varieties, and few of them remain without intermixture with the sheep of the adjoining country.

Those of Cannock Chase, or Sutton Coldfield sheep, the native shortwooled breed of Staffordshire, were polled, with gray faces, or of every intermediate color between black and white. They were thin in proportion to their length, otherwise they would resemble more the Southdown sheep, from a common stock with which they probably sprung. Their mutton was good, and they fattened with moderate food; at three years old their flesh was equal to that of any other breed. They were capable of growing to a very great weight. The wool averaged about 3 pounds to a fleece. It was fine, closely covering the carcass, but inferior to that of the Southdown. Attempts made to improve the breed by crossing resulted in improved form, increased weight, and wool of enhanced value.

The Delamere Forest or Cheshire sheep are the type of the old sheep of Shropshire, and approach to the general form of the Southdown. Usually they have small horns, and black, brown, gray, or spotted faces and legs. They somewhat resemble the diminutive Norfolk, and weigh about 8 to 10 pounds per quarter. The flesh equals that of other small breeds, and the wool is short and particularly fine, weighing about 14 pounds per fleece. They are a variety of the true native breed of England. Their wool used to be in much demand by the Yorkshire manufacturers of fine cloths.

The Cannock Heath sheep and the Delamere are practically ex.tinct, or so crossed with other breeds as to have lost their ancient characters, but of the forest breeds two remain which preserve more decidedly their identity. They exist in the elevated country between the Bristol and British Channels, the one inhabiting the heathy tract of granite forming the forest of Dartmoor, the other the district of Greywacke of the forest of Exmoor, at the sources of the river Exe, on the confines of Somerset and Devon. These two races have long attracted attention from their having supplied the well-known Oakhampton mutton, so named from the sheep having been killed at that town, whence the carcasses are sent to London. But the Oakhampton mutton now not only includes that of the forest sheep, but that of the crosses between them and other breeds.* They are everywhere of nearly the same character and betray on a smaller scale a great affinity with the Dorsets.

The Dartmoor sheep.-These sheep are very small and have long, soft wool, in which respects they differ from the other forest breeds. They have white faces and legs and generally have horns; they are small in the head and neck and small in the bone everywhere; the carcass is narrow and flat-sided, and they weigh when fat from 9 to 12 pounds per quarter. They produce delicate mutton, which finds a ready sale at high prices in the metropolitan market; and the flesh of the old wethers, when it has been hung a sufficient length of time, has considerable resemblance to venison. These sheep are exceedingly wild and restless and are apt to break their pastures when

*Youatt,

removed to a more inclosed country.* They are well adapted to the barren district to which nature assigned them, but on the whole are not profitable because of their small size, defective form, and above all, their wild and restless temper. They are being crossed so persistently with the Leicester and Southdown that as a pure breed they are practically extinct.

The Exmoor sheep.-The Exmoor sheep, another mountain race, are yet smaller, wilder, and more intractable than the Dartmoor. The district they inhabit in the far county of Somerset and also bordering North Devon is of limited extent, being an elevated range of hills extending from Minehead to South Molton, and mostly of open, uncultivated commons, bearing little but heather. Here these wild and hardy sheep have existed beyond the pale of history or tradition. Coleman admits the probability that the breed had its origin from the same ancient stock as the Portland or even the Dorset, for the sheep that once existed on the Mendip Hills seemed a connecting link between them. Although ranging heaths so near the Dartmoors, they differ in some respects, and so may be termed a breed. They possess strong constitutions, which admit of their being buried for several days in a snowdrift; a fine, curly horn; a broad, square loin; round ribs; a drum-like (not square) carcass, on short legs; and a close-set fleece, with wool well up to the cheeks. They have white faces, legs, and fleeces, and though standing well on their fore legs there is a failing point behind the shoulder. They are also indifferent about the neck. The males have a large beard under the chin, which causes them to resemble goats, and they greatly resemble those animals in strength and agility. Like goats they ascend precipices, and it is with difficulty that they are kept in ordinary inclosures. They are bold and pugnacious, and attack sheep larger than themselves. They are on the whole a hardy and prolific breed. The females, as in the case of other wild breeds, are considerably smaller than the males. Both ewes and wethers run on the hill commons nearly all the year round; the former only being brought down at the lambing season, which is usually in March and April, when they often give birth to twins or triplets.

The wool of these sheep is long and silky, averaging about 4 to 41 pounds. Their mutton is excellent, of which they give 15 pounds to the quarter, and in some improved flocks an eighteen months' old sheep has given 20 pounds to the quarter. Like the Dartmoors, in some places where these sheep were once known, they have now disappeared, giving way to crosses or to the Cheviot, but in some districts they have maintained themselves, and a great demand has sprung up for superior rams of this breed.

Coleman, in closing his interesting description of these sheep, the mode of treatment and their improvement, says that their improvement has been brought about by a careful and judicious selection of rams, comprehensive welding of ewes, and skillful matchings; or in other words, by breeding on the in-and-in system, and, whatever is thought of the Exmoor, sufficient merit is exemplified under cultivation to invest the sheep with high claims for perpetuity of existence. The improvement of the breed has recently progressed quite as

*Youatt says that the diminutive horned sheep kept in the neighborhood of Oakhampton, and from which the Dartmoor mutton that supplies the distant markets is chiefly obtained, are small Dorsets, or at least very much resemble the smaller Dorset breed,

fast as the reclamation of the hill commons; and if sufficient quality and capability to put on flesh rapidly can be imparted to this hardy and prolific stock, for the future requirements of agriculture on this elevated tract of country, we may hope that it will be one of the few mountain species that the hand of civilization will spare.

Traces of the Exmoor form appear in the races of the country on the Mendip Hills; and along the Bristol Channel is a remnant of an allied breed. The sheep of the Mendip Hills were formerly distinguished for the fineness of their wool, but these sheep no longer exist in their pure state; they have been crossed with superior breeds or abandoned for other sheep until none are cultivated of pure blood. Some of the forest breeds were at least equal to the original Southdown, among which may be mentioned those of Staffordshire-the Cannock Heath, or Sutton Coldfield sheep.*

The Ryeland breed.-Lying between the mountains of Wales on the west and the river Severn on the east, there is a tract of country that from the earliest known period has sustained a race of sheep of small size, seldom exceeding 14 to 16 pounds the quarter, and noted for the softness and fineness of their wool, which grows close to and sometimes shades their eyes. This breed extended also into Monmouthshire on the south, into Shropshire on the north, and into Gloucestershire and Warwickshire on the east, occupying many forests and commons, and was known under many different names, such as Hereford, from the county where most generally raised; Archerfield, from that town; and sometimes the Ross breed, from the southeastern district of the county lying between Dean Forest and Malvern Hills. But the name by which it is generally known is the Ryeland, so called from a district in the southern part of Hereford County, on which a great quantity of rye used to be grown, and where many of these sheep were bred.

History gives us no record of the derivation of this breed from any other country, from which it may be assumed that it was indigenous to the district, or at least had been for a long time an occupant there. It is placed by some as a variety of that widely diffused race of soft-wooled sheep extending at one time from the mountains and islands of Scotland to the mountains of Wales, and in possession of the earliest Celtic inhabitants of the British Islands. Low conjectures that from its diminutive size, patience of scanty food, and the lightness of its fleece, it was the native of countries of a low degree of fertility, probably of districts of forest, which, until cleared of their wood, are always unproductive with respect to the nutritious grasses, and that the noted fineness of its fleece caused the preservation of the breed long after the forests were cleared and the country became capable of supporting larger animals.

The wool of this ancient sheep was long regarded as the finest produced in Britain, and the old chroniclers compare it to that of Apulia and Tarentum. One practice calculated to preserve and increase the fineness of the wool was that of cotting, which continued until a recent period. Although now almost entirely neglected, it was probably founded on the evident utility and humanity of the practice-preserving the sheep from cruel and injurious exposure to cold and from the ravages of wolves. During the winter, and especially at the time of lambing, the animals were kept during the night in large houses or in a place erected for this special purpose, capable

* The Cattle, Sheep, and Pigs of Great Britain.

of holding from 100 to 500. They were fed with hay or barley straw, given to them in racks, frequently suspended by ropes, and so contrived as to be easily raised in proportion as the dung accumulated below; for neither the owner nor the shepherd thought of cleaning out the place while there was room for the sheep to go in and out. It may be supposed that this practice was continued by habit, but special reasons have been assigned-that the wool, being preserved from the injurious effect of sudden change or inclemency of weather was sounder and finer; that the sheep were in better health; that especially they were preserved from the rot; that fewer lambs were lost at yeaning time; that great losses were always incurred when it was attempted to fold the sheep; and that much valuable dung was collected and saved. It is sufficiently evident, however, that the requisite protection of the sheep from cold, when yeaning and at other times, could have been afforded in open sheds at less expense; that in the usual way of folding the dung could have been more cheaply carried to the ground and more equally spread and better trodden; and that many sheep could scarcely have been crowded together during the night, in a close building and on an accumulating and fermenting heap of dung, without serious loss.* The Ryeland and its subvarieties have practically disappeared. Their former value, arising from the worth of their wool in the manufacture of native cloth, could not be maintained against the Spanish and Saxony wool, and as mutton sheep they have yielded the ground to those longer-wooled sheep producing larger returns to the breeder.

The Shropshire Down sheep.-Sheep husbandry in England is not only an exact science but a progressive one, working continuously on natural laws for the improvement of good breeds, and, at times, producing new ones of superior merit. Among these may be named the Shropshire. The old sheep of Shropshire were of many breeds, but time and circumstances gave them a more equal character. Many of these breeds have passed away; some of them yet remain, but in an improved condition. These were originally horned, and with black or mottled faces and legs. They were about the size of the Southdown, but the neck was longer and the carcass not so compact. They were hardy, and rarely had food given to them in the winter, except in a deep snow. At the beginning of this century the Shropshire sheep weighed from 14 to 16 pounds per quarter; the fleece of the wether about 24 pounds, but that of the ewe not more than 1 pounds. They used sometimes to be crossed by the Dorsets. The carcass was increased to 18 to 20 pounds the quarter, and the fleece to 3 or 4 pounds, but the quality of both was deteriorated. They were, however, thought to pay the farmers better than the old breed.

The common mountain sheep of Shropshire was smaller, being scarcely more than 10 or 12 pounds to the quarter; but the wool was finer, and sold at a somewhat higher price. Another Shropshire sheep was the Clun Forest, a white polled variety, from 12 to 14 pounds the quarter, and the fleece weighing from 2 to 3 pounds; and one smaller than all others, called the "Tadpole."

The Long Mynd or Mound sheep were horned, with black faces, weighing about 12 pounds the quarter, and the wool being very little

inferior to that of the common mountain sheep. On the hills near Wales the sheep were polled, with white faces. They were larger, shorter in the legs, and the fleeces heavier and closer than those of the Long Mynd sheep. Youatt says that the sheep, however, which was the pride and boast of Shropshire, and scarcely excelled in fineness of wool even by the Ryelands, was the Morfe Common sheep. This tract of land is situated on the borders of the Severn, near Bridgenorth, and contains nearly 4,000 acres. The ewes were fed on the common from the middle of June to October, when the young sheep were brought on it for the winter. From the shortness of the pastures and the quantity of furze about the common the sheep began to lose their teeth at five years old, and were then disposed of. The Morfe sheep had small horns, with speckled, dark, or black faces and legs; the wether weighing about 13 pounds, and the ewe 9 pounds the quarter, and the fleece weighing about 2 pounds. In many points resembling the Ryeland, if indeed not a variety of that breed, it had been found from time immemorial in various parts of Worcestershire, Shropshire, and Staffordshire. It was probably this species of Shropshire wool that in 1343 was the choicest and the dearest in England, and at every succeeding period, when mention has been made of it, justice has been done to its excellent quality. It has now shared the fate of every short-wooled fleece. The importation of a better material and the tyranny of fashion tempted the farmer to cross even this breed with a heavier sheep; and the experiment, however it may have answered to him in a pecuniary point of view, materially changed the character and the destiny of the Morfe fleece.

In 1792, when the British Wool Society procured all the information possible regarding the sheep of England, they reported that on Morfe Common there were about 10,000 sheep kept during the summer months, which produced wool of superior quality. They were considered a native breed; were black-faced or brown or spottedfaced, horned sheep, little subject to either rot or scab; weighing, the wethers from 11 to 14 pounds, and the ewes from 9 to 11 pounds the quarter.

Upon this and other evidence Professor Wilson concludes that the original stock from which the present breed of Shropshire Downs sprung was the old Morfe Common, and as the country advanced and the breeds became valuable for their carcasses as well as for their wool, the Morfe Common sheep were crossed with other breeds, but more particularly with the long-wooled Leicester and Cotswolds or the short-wooled Southdown. The admixture of such different blood has produced a corresponding variation in the character of the present breed of Shropshire Downs, and tended materially to sustain the hesitation which long existed to allow them a place as a distinct breed. Where, however, the original cross was with the Southdown and the breed has been continued unmixed with the long-wooled sheep, they present the characteristics of a short-wooled breed.*

This view is not universally shared, and it is not unhesitatingly acknowledged that the Shropshire Down is a pure sheep descended from the Morfe Common. It is held by many that, though modern sheep in their improved character, the original stocks were the Long Mynds in Shropshire and the Cannock Chase of Staffordshire, and *Prof. John Wilson, in Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, vol. XVI.