IX
Stock

The Pharaohs to the shepherds said,
"What outer lands we place ye on,
There you shall make your home and bed,
You're an abomin-a-ti-on."
See Genesis xlvi. 34.

I have written of dogs and horses and pigs, but so far not on the sheep and cattle out of which I have had to make my living.

Whether it is because for so many generations they have not needed to use their wits, or because they are not allowed to live long enough to develop what few they have, I do not know, but sheep certainly seem to me rather brainless and stupid beasts, and I have never been able to take much interest in them. And there is the question of the possession of that none too common gift, an eye for stock, and I have none. In equine matters, for instance, an old Yorkshire friend of mine has only to "cast his eye" over a horse once, and he can recognise him anywhere to the end of the beast's life, whereas if I ride a horse for a week, I may have great difficulty in picking him out of a dozen driven page 60in for saddling. I even went wrong with a horse so marked that I had thought I could never mistake him, and came home with someone else's fancy piebald, but that was partly the stableman's fault.

This Yorkshireman had a first-class "eye for sheep" too. He had been engaged in town commercial life at Home, but though emigrating almost at middle age, he before long was quite a noted breeder of highclass Romney rams.

His son inherits his ability, and takes the greatest delight in recognising, in individuals of his flock, the characteristics of the various rams introduced many generations ago, every one of whose qualities and features he seems to have clearly in his mind. He, though a highly cultivated man, can spend hours and hours discussing the technicalities of sheep-breeding with old chaps who could never think or talk of anything else, while as for myself, I confess to a certain sympathy with Touchstone in his views on the question and also with the Egyptians, to whom every shepherd was an abomination. I consoled myself with the reflection that perhaps the next best thing to doing a thing well, is to know definitely that you never could do it, and to refrain from trying. "Breaking in" country and arranging a really workable page break

Plate X
Fencing Burnt Fern Country

Plate X
The Buckboard

page 61sheep-run were jobs that I delighted in; but running a finished station year after year was not in my line at all.

The reference to Touchstone above, reminds me that there does not seem to have been, in Shakespeare's time, any sort of conscience among; sheep owners as to the soundness of the mutton they supplied. Said Antonio:

"I am the tainted wether of the flock, Meetest for death."

No New Zealand sheep farmer would talk like that. In fact the presence of a competent government Vet on the killing platform of every abattoir and freezing works would take all the sense out of his words if he did.

And as I have here wandered into a freezing works, it may interest my readers to know that as certain seamen are alluded to according to their jobs as Chips, Lamps or Pills, the name both in common and official use for the man who initiates the process of cleansing those parts of the sheep which salted down are ultimately used to cover sausages is "Guts," and to this name even when shouted at him he answers without heat. But should yon see him at work you would understand that no mere verbal insult would be at all likely to offend him, ever.

Our country would not carry the picturesque, curly-horned merino sheep, from, which comes all the very fine wool—it needs above all, dry country, whether flat or mountainous; with us it suffers too badly from foot-rot to be of any use. From what species of mountain sheep the Merino is derived I know not, but its appearance, its wool, its habits and nerves are so distinct that if it has an ancestor in common with the ordinary long-wool sheep, he must be very far back.

The breed that has been found to suit our part best, a very much improved "Romney Marsh" coming originally from Kent, is a placid long-wooled animal that can stand an occasional wet season and makes good frozen mutton, which the merino does not.

Cattle did not directly pay us at all, as however good beef frozen may be, it cannot compete with meat that is only chilled. And it has not yet been found commercially possible to keep meat just at freezing point and no lower for so long a voyage.

But, with only sheep on a run, the grass in a good season grows into tussocks, and new grass coming up in a dead tussock is neglected by sheep and wasted, whereas a bullock will put his tongue round it and swallow the lot, leaving clean ground for page 63fresh feed. So you may have land fully stocked with sheep and yet if you add some cattle, you, may be able to carry them, and even to add to your flock as well. We found Herefords the best breed, as they will range for feed far higher up the hills than short-horns, the latter having a tendency to keep near the stream at the bottom. I heard from a cattle owner of N.W. Australia that he had found exactly the same thing; even in flat country, the Herefords ranged out double as far as the others. Their ancestors, I suppose, must have had to travel far for their living in wild Wales.