uses of the wool. It is softer, because it is finer than the picklock South Down, but its felting properties are not so great, and it is therefore used for somewhat inferior purposes. The price of the Wiltshire wool has certainly advanced within the last few years, and now seems to be steady at from 1s. 4d. to 1s. 6d. per lb.
Mr. Carr of Standerwick has kindly communicated the following account of the South Downs in the neighbourhood of Warminster. "They were first brought particularly into notice by Mr. Rickwood of Longbridge Deverill. They are active in searching for food, but otherwise of a quiet nature, and bearing the fold well. About 15 years ago they were attempted to be crossed by the Hampshire sheep, but the experiment did not succeed, and is now abandoned; the size was somewhat increased, but the propensity to fatten was considerably diminished. There is some defect of form in the fore-quarter, and particularly behind the shoulder. The average weight of the ewe is from 14 lbs. to 18 lbs. per quarter, and that of the wether from 16 to 20 lbs.; but they have been fattened to 40 lbs. per quarter. A four-tooth wether will usually eat 15 lbs. of turnips, or 20 lbs. of vetches, per day. The working stock have the down feed, with occasionally a portion of the second year's ley; and in the autumn some turnips. In the winter they depend chiefly on hay, unless under-stocked, there seldom being much grass left at that season of the year. The wool varies from 2½ to 3 lbs. on the ewe, and reaches to 4 or 4½ on the wether. The chalk and chalky loams produce the softest wool, and the red flinty loams the harshest: both are generally sent into Yorkshire and Glamorganshire." According to this gentleman, if there is any difference in the wool, it consists in its being finer than it was ten years ago. The ewes seldom produce more than one lamb at each birth, and the general deficiency of lambs, including barren ewes, &c., is about 15 per cent. The lambs are tailed in April, and castrated in May, the iron being used for both purposes: the operators are persons who make it their profession; and so skilful are some of them, that, out of 4000 lambs, Mr. Carr lost only three. The value of the ewe, taking an average often years, is about 24s., and that of a lamb 15s. or 16s., the wool being from 1s. to 1s. 1d. per lb.; and, on the whole, sheep-farming is the sheet-anchor of South-west Wiltshire husbandry.
Mr. Benett, M.P. for Wiltshire, still continues a zealous breeder and advocate of the Merinos, and there are some flocks of these sheep and of crosses from them in various parts of the county. The soil and the climate seemed to agree better with them here than in any other district in the kingdom, and they also here found a breed of sheep, which they could more rapidly improve, and with which they could more perfectly amalgamate than in any other district. Mr. Bartley gives an interesting account of this:—"I had twelve ewes shorn, the fleeces weighing 6½ lbs. per fleece. These sheep descended from Wiltshire ewes carrying fleeces of about 3½ lbs. only; but, by repeated crossings—the first and second by his Majesty's ram—they now approach very nearly to the entire Spanish blood, evinced also by the following circumstances:—like ewes of the Spanish breed they are hornless, whereas Wiltshire ewes as well as rams are well known to be horned sheep. The fleeces are close, compact, equal in weight with the Spanish, and acknowledged by competent judges to be equal in goodness too[1]."
It is to be hoped that the Merino breed will continue to be preserved by Mr. Benett and other zealous agriculturists; for the change which
- ↑ Agricultural Magazine, April, 1803.
