OP SCOTBANB.

149

is in frequent fluctuation, some selling off as they grow fat,and others bought in to fill up vacancies

The breeding of sheep upon rich arable land, is a deci-sive evidence of a high degree of agricultural improvement.So little compatible are the habits of sheep considered to bewith cultivation, that in some leases, in the less improved dis-tricts of Scotland , farmers are expressly prohibited frontkeeping any •, and indeed it is scarcely possible to confinethe mountain-breeds within ordinary fences, or to preventthem from destroying young hedges and plantations. Abreed such as the Leicester, of a quiet, domesticated disposi-tion, was therefore a vast acquisition to the arable land ofScotland . At the same time, while no other domesticated ani-mal ameliorates both the pastures and turnip-fields so muchas the sheep, such a variety as the Leicester, can only bekept with advantage in those situations, where improved hus-bandry has made considerable progress. At least, this mustnecessarily be the case in Scotland , where there is little richold pasture, and where the climate requires that their foodfor six months in the year, must be provided by means of theplough. Turnips are an indispensable article to the successof these sheep in Scotland , and it fortunately happens, thatthey arc no less necessary to the improvement of all thin drysoils. Without turnips, partly consumed by sheep on theground, and without such sheep as the Leicesters, that canbe easily confined on them by hurdles or nets, the light soilsof Scotland , could never have been rendered nearly so pro-ductive in grain.

Berwickshire Report, p. 402.