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foreign ram to raise the improved cross-bred animals for fatting either as lambs or sheep. This plan is adopted by many breeders of Leicester sheep, who thus employ South Down rams to improve the quality of the mutton. One inconvenience attending this plan, is the necessity of fatting the maiden ewes as well as the wethers; they may however be disposed of as fat lambs, or the practice of spaying might be adopted, so as to increase the fatting disposition of the animal. Crossing, therefore, should be adopted with the greatest caution and skill where the object is to improve the breed of animals; it should never be practiced carelessly or capriciously, but it may be advantageously pursued with a view to raising superior and profitable animals for the butcher." In another paper on this subject, after presenting many interesting details regarding British breeds of sheep and the results of crossing, Mr. Spooner says: "We cannot do better, in concluding our paper, than gather up and arrange in a collected form, the various points of our subject, which appear to be of sufficient importance to be again presented to the attention of our readers. We think, therefore, we are justified in coming to the conclusions: 1st. That there is a direct pecuniary advantage in judicious cross-breeding; that increased size, disposition to fatten, and early maturity, are thereby induced. 2d. That while this may be caused for the most part, by the very fact of crossing, yet it is principally due to the superior influence of the male over the size and external appearance of the offspring; so that it is desirable, for the purpose of the butcher, that the male should be of a larger frame than the female, and should excel in those peculiarities we are desirous of reproducing. Let it be here however, repeated, as an exceptional truth, that though as a rule the male parent influences mostly the size and external form, and the female parent the constitution, general health and vital powers, yet that the opposite result sometimes takes place. 3d. Certain peculiarities may be imparted to a breed by a single cross. Thus, the ponies of the New Forest exhibit characteristics of blood, although it is many years since that a thorough-bred horse was turned into the forest for the purpose. So, likewise,
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