These animals, whose understandings are so simple, are also of a very weak constitution. They cannot walk long; travelling weakens and exhausts them; and when they run, they pant and are soon out of breath. The great heat of the sun, is as disagreeable to them, as too much moisture, cold, or snow. They are subject to many disorders, the greatest part of which are contagious. Superabundance of fat sometimes kills them, and always prevents the ewes from having young. They suffer a great deal in breeding, have frequent abortions and require more care than any other domestic animal.[H]
[H] There appears in the text a degree of unusual asperity against this harmless animal, and all its imperfections seem pictured in glaring colours, but in this, as well as in several other particulars, some exaggeration is adopted, since scarce any domestic animal, at the time of bringing forth, requires less assistance than the ewe does in general.
When the ewe is near her time, she should be taken from the rest of the flock, and watched in order to be near to help her in delivery. The lamb frequently presents itself cross-ways, or by the feet; and, in this case, the mother's life is in danger if she is not assisted. As soon as she is delivered, the lamb should be lifted on its feet, and the milk drawn out of the mother's teats; this first milk being bad would do much hurt to the lamb, and therefore it is necessary to stay till the teats are filled again, before it is suffered to suck. The lamb is kept warm, and shut up for two or three days with the mother, that it may learn to know her. For a few days, in order to re-establish the strength of the ewe, she should be fed with hay, barley wetted, or bran mixed with a little salt. The water she drinks should be luke-warm, with some wheat or bean flour, or millet put into it. In four or five days she may again be used, by degrees, to her common manner of living, and may be put amongst the others, only observing not to take her too far, lest it should overheat her milk. Some time after, when the lamb begins to have strength, and to skip about, it may, with safety, be suffered to follow its mother into the fields.
It is usual to send those lambs which appear weak to the butcher, and to preserve those which are the largest, are most vigorous, and have the thickest fleece; the first lambs are scarcely ever so good as those of the following litters. If those lambs are wanted to be reared which are brought forth in October, November December, January, or February, they are kept in the stable, and only let out to suck mornings and evenings, until the beginning of April. Some time before letting them out they should daily have a little grass, for the purpose of accustoming them by degrees to their new nourishment. They may be weaned as early as a month old, but it is better to let them suck for six weeks or two months. Lambs which are all white, and without spots, are always preferred because white wool always produces the best price. Lambs should not be castrated before they are five or six months old at the earliest, and then the operation should be performed when the weather is moderate, either in spring or autumn: it is done two ways, either by incision, or by destroying the vessels, which terminate in them, by a tight ligature. Castration makes lambs sick and melancholy, and to prevent the disgust which generally succeeds, they should have bran given them mixed with a little salt for two or three days.