going to relate may fairly be said to have begun with eating,
for although we started for our twelve miles' drive over the downs
immediately after an excellent and somewhat late breakfast, yet by the
time we reached the Home Station we were quite ready for luncheon. All
the work connected with the sheep is carried on here. The manager has
a nice house; and the wool-shed, men's huts, dip, etc., are near each
other. It is the busiest season of the year, and no time could be
spared to prepare for us; we therefore contented ourselves with what was
described to me as ordinary station fare, and I must tell you what they
gave us: first, a tureen of real mutton-broth, not hot water and chopped
parsley, but excel-lent thick soup, with plenty of barley and meat in
it; this had much the same effect on our appetites as the famous treacle
and brimstone before breakfast in "Nicholas Nickleby," so that we were
only able to manage a few little sheeps' tongues, slightly pickled; and
very nice _they_ were; then we finished with a Devonshire junket, with
clotted cream _a discretion_. Do you think we were much to be pitied?

After this repast we were obliged to rest a little before we set out
for the wool-shed, which has only been lately finished, and has all the
newest improvements. At first I am "free to confess" that I did not like
either its sounds or sights; the other two ladies turned very pale, but
I was determined to make myself bear it, and after a moment or two I
found it quite possible to proceed with Mr. L----round the "floor."
There were about twenty-five shearers at work, and everything seemed to
be very systematically and well arranged. Each shearer has a trap-door
close to him, out of which he pushes his sheep as soon as the fleece is
off, and there are little pens outside, so that the manager can notice
whether the poor animal has been too much cut with the shears, or badly
shorn in any other respect, and can tell exactly which shearer is to
blame. Before this plan was adopted it was hopeless to try to find out
who was the delinquent, for no one would acknowledge to the least snip.
A good shearer can take off 120 fleeces in a day, but the average is
about 80 to each man. They get one pound per hundred, and are found in
everything, having as much tea and sugar, bread and mutton, as they can
consume, and a cook entirely to themselves; they work at least fourteen
hours out of the twenty-four, and with such a large flock as thi