cres--fenced off in lots of from four to six thousand acres, and
into one of these he turned from six to eight thousand sheep, leaving them
to graze as they pleased. He had noticed, he told me, that whereas the
sheep under the usual corral system feed the greater part of the day, no
matter how hot the sun, his sheep in these large pastures were lying down
from nine in the morning to four or five in the afternoon; and he often
found them feeding far into the night, and rising again to graze long
before daylight. They were at liberty to follow their own pleasure, having
water always at hand. An abundant supply of water he thought of great
importance.

[Illustration: INDIAN SWEAT-HOUSE.]

Of course, where the sheep are turned out into fenced land no shepherds
are required, which makes an important saving. One man, with a horse,
visits the different flocks, and can look after ten or fifteen thousand
head.

The farmer whom I have quoted does not dip his sheep to prevent or cure
scab, but mops the sore place, when he discovers a scabby sheep, with a
sponge dipped into the scab-mixture.

He gets, he told me, from his flock of ten thousand merinoes, an average
of seven pounds per head of wool, and he does not shear any except the
lambs, in the fall. It is a common but bad practice here to shear all
sheep twice a year; and where, as is too often the case, a flock is very
scabby, no doubt this is necessary.

He had long sheds as shelter for his ewes about lambing-time, so as to
protect them against fierce winds and cold rain storms; and he saved every
year about two hundred tons of hay, cut from the wild pastures, to feed
in case the rain should hold off uncommonly late. His aim was to keep the
sheep always in good condition, so that there should never be any weak
place in the wool. His sheds cost him about one dollar per running foot.
The sheep found their own way to them.

I find it is the habit of the forehanded sheep-grazers in the Sacramento
Valley to own a range in the foot-hills and another on the bottom-lands.
During the summer the sheep are kept in the bottoms, which are then dry
and full of rich grasses; in the fall and winter they are taken to the
uplands, and there they lamb, and are shorn. Where the range lies too far
away from any river, they drive the sheep in May into the mountains, where
they have green grass all summer; and about Red Bluff I saw a curious
sight--cattle and horses wandering, singly or in sm