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probable that they were not. But Henry the Second paid so much attention to the manufacture and improvement of this commodity, as to forbid the use of any other but English wool in the making of cloth. Yet, the excellence of English wool was long known before the English paid much atten. tion to the art of making woollen cloth, or attain. ed any superior skill in it. Wool was then a staple article for exportation; and the Flemings were their merchants. But in the reign of Queen Eli zabeth, several favourable circumstances, which the talents and the patriotic spirit of that princess enabled her to take advantage of, concurred to establish the woollen manufactory in England, in that thriving state in which it has since continued. In Scotland, we have never attained great excellence in this manufacture. Yet, the bonnets,

which, though now very much out of use, were in former times very generally used as a covering for the head, and the stockings of such superior fineness, for which the isles of Shetland and the city of Aberdeen are still celebrated, are articles which shew that the inhabitants of Scotland are not less capable of ingenuity in this way than their neighbours of England. The Spanish wool has been much celebrated; and it is not very long since broad cloth bearing the name of Spanish was prized above the English. But, the wool produced in Britain has been, by various arts, so much improved, as to be now not inferior in excellence to that of Spain; and no woollen cloth is at present esteemed superior to that of English manufacture. The sheep with the finest fleeces in England are fed on the Coteswold Downs, and in Herefordshire, Devonshire, Lincolnshire, Suffolk, and Yorkshire. The wool of Wales is coarse; nor is that of Scotland, except in some instances, remarkable for fineness. The wool of the small sheep in the High

lands, and the isles of Scotland, is superior to the finest Spanish or English wool.

* The skin of this animal is prepared into leather for an inferior sort of shoes, for the coverings of books, and for gloves, and into parchment.

The entrails, by a proper preparation, are made into strings for various musical instruments.

The milk of the sheep is thicker than cow's milk. Its taste is rather disagreeably strong, It is, therefore, rather made into cheese than used for drinking. The cheese is rich, and of a strong taste. It would, probably, be still better, if more attention were paid to cleanliness in the preparing of it. It were, perhaps, best to leave all the milk of the ewe to her lamb.

The flesh of the sheep is perhaps our most valuable article of animal food. It is neither disagreebly coarse, nor yet so tender and delicate as not to afford strengthening nourishment, The flesh of the lamb is, in the proper season, one of the nicest delicacies that the epicure can desire.

The bones are useful for various purposes. Of these, as well of other bones calcined, are made the cupels used in the refining of metals.

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Mr. Pennant mentions the dung as an excellent manure. But, it is not often, I believe, that sheep are fed in such numbers on arable lands, as that their dung can be collected for this purpose.

The modes of managing sheep differ in different countries, and even in the same country. The lambs are seldom separated from their mothers till they become large and vigorous. As one ram is able to impregnate a good many ewes, only a small proportion of the male lambs are permitted to retain their organs of generation unmutilated. Wedders are less vicious than rams; and their flesh has a better flavour and relish. In summer, before being shorn, sheep are commonly washed, to improve

the whiteness of the wool. Where sheep are not shorn, they change their fleeces annually; and the best time for shearing, is when the fleece is just ready to fall of itself. The time of the sheepshearing is always a period of festivity with the shepherds. It was such, in ancient times, among the shepherds of Judea. In Scotland, and in other northern countries, sheep are usually smeared with a mixture of butter and tar about the end of autumu, to fortify and protect them against the severities of winter. It seems a necessary precaution, where the flocks cannot be sheltered in sheds, and fed with hay and other suitable food, during the inclemency of the severe season. But this mixture of tar and butter is often so injudiciously laid on, as to injure the health of the sheep, and even to render its fleece less warm than it would otherwise be. It greatly contaminates the whiteness of the wool; but if the butter be in due proportion, is, perhaps, rather favourable to its fineness. In the sheep countries of Scotland, it is often necessary to remove the flocks in winter from the hills on which they usually feed, to low lands, where they may find some herbage, and be protected from the seve rity of the season. Could the practice of folding sheep in sheds, and feeding them with hay, or leaves of cabbage, common green kail, or turnips, during the storms of winter, be conveniently adopted through Scotland, it would possibly prove highly advantageous to their proprietors. Even in the mildest winters, considerable numbers perish under the present modes of management. Crawford-muir, in Clydesdale, is one of the chief sheep countries in Scotland. The management of sheep is there well understood. Men from that part have of late attempted to teach the inhabitants of the Highlands how to manage their sheep better, and derive greater profits from them.

Even in Britain we have a good many different breeds of this animal. Linnæus distinguishes the breed peculiar to England, as destitute of horns, and having its tail and scrotum depending to the knees. This is the fine large breed for which Warwickshire, and particularly Lincolnshire, is noted. They have, in the course of the last twenty years, been introduced into Galloway and other parts of Scotland, under the denomination of mugg sheep. Their flesh is rather coarse, and their wool intermixed with dry hair. This is the hornless sheep of Pennant.

Our other sheep are chiefly of the common horned breed. In Wales, and through most of the sheep pastures in Scotland, they are small and hardy. In delicacy of flavour and relish, their flesh is much superior to that of the larger breed; and even their wool, where the nature of their pasture is not such as to injure it greatly, is said to be of the best quality. The common colour is white; yet we sometimes observe a black, or a dark grey fleece, and a smutted face: this is called the common sheep, as being more common than any other variety of the species, throughout all Europe. Some ancient writers speak of a breed of sheep with golden teeth, as belonging to Scotland. This appears, at first sight, incredible; but Mr. Pennant has explained the wonder, by telling us, that he saw at Athol house, in the year 1772, the jaws of an ox, containing teeth thickly incrusted with a gold-coloured pyrites. The same thing might happen to sheep.

THE

PARNASSIAN GARLAND,

FOR NOVEMBER, 1801.

THOUGHTS ON PEACE.

TILL o'er that shrine defiance rears its head,

STW

Which rolls in silent murmurs o'er the dead,
That shrine which conquest, as it stems the flood,
Too often tinges deep with human blood;
Still o'er the land stern devastation reigns,
Its giant mountains, and its spreading plains,
Where the dark pines, their heads all gloomy, wave,
Or rushing cataracts, loud sounding, lave
The precipice, whose brow with awful pride
Tow'rs high above, and scorns the foaming tide;
The village sweet, the forest stretching far,
Groan undistinguish'd, 'mid the shock of war.
There, the rack'd matron sees her son expire,
There, clasps the infant son his murder'd sire,
While the sad virgin on her lover's face,

Weeps with the last farewell, the last embrace,
And the lone widow too, with frenzied cries,
Amid the common wreck, unheeded dies.

O Peace, bright Seraph, heaven lov'd maid, return!
And bid distracted nature cease to mourn;
O, let the ensign drear of war be furl'd,
And pour thy blessings on a bleeding world;
Then social order shall again expand,
Its sovereign good again shall bless the land,
Elate the simple villager shall see,
Contentment's inoffensive revelry:

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