by-products. The notion is
that the wool and manure of a sheep would meet the expense of its keep
and that the mutton would be profit. Hopes of an extension of sheep
breeding resting on such a basis seem to be extravagant. One high
authority told me that it would take twenty or thirty years to develop
sheep keeping.

The sheep at present in Japan are not living in natural conditions.
They feed on cultivated crops. Sheep could hardly live a week on
natural Japanese pasture. The wild herbage is full of the sharp bamboo
grass. In the summer much of the eatable herbage dries up. Not only
must sheep endure the summer heat and insects; they must survive the
trying rainy season. But they must do more than merely endure and
survive. In order to produce good wool it is necessary that they shall
be in good condition. The hair of one's head immediately shows the
effect of imperfect nutrition or unhealthy conditions, and it is the
same with the wool on the back of the sheep.

It is said that the quality of the wool on the sheep kept in Japan
depreciates. However this may be, it is plain that sheep breeding must
be conducted on a large scale in order to produce wool in commercial
quantities and of even quality. Some notion of the land normally
required for sheep may be estimated from the fact that Australian
pasture carries no more than four sheep per acre.[266]

An improvement of Japanese herbage sufficient to fit it for sheep
would be a heavy task even in small areas. It is not only the herbage
but the rocks below it which are all wrong for sheep, if we are to
judge by the geological formations on which sheep flourish in the
West. If the sheep were put on cultivated land[267] or placed on straw
as I saw them in Hokkaido there would be serious risks of foot rot. No
doubt there would also be insect pests to control. If Japan set up
sheep keeping she would no doubt have to devise her own special breed
of sheep, for the well-known Western breeds are artificial products.
Probably the experiments which are being made in China with sheep at
an earlier stage of development are proceeding on the right lines. I
have already spoken of the fact that a Japanese taste for mutton has
yet to be cultivated.

This is a formidable list of difficulties confronting the new
Governmental Sheep Bureau. No doubt much may be done by a large
expenditure of money and much patience. The Japanese have wrought
marvels before by spending money and having a