HOLKHAM SHEEP-SHEARING, (ENG.)
This festival, established by T. W. Coke, Esq. forty-three years ago, commenced on 10th July last.——Among the company present this year were, his Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, Princes Potemkin and Trabetzkoy, (Russia,) the Marquis of Downshire, Earl of Albemarle; Lords Waterpark, Erskine, Anson, Ebrington, Lynedock, Delaware;—Hon. Mr. Keppel, Hon. Geo. Walpole, Hon. Gen. Fitzroy, Hon. Mr. Thellison, Sir John Sinclair, Bart. Sir Wm. Hoste, Bart. T. W. Coke, jr. Esq. M. P.; G. W. Hall, Esq. Thos. Gay, Esq. (Herts,) Robert Patterson, Esq. (Baltimore,) C. Deering, Esq. (Middlesex,) Mons. Petit, Esq. (Paris,) Thos. B. Beevor, Esq. J. Ellman, Esq. (Sussex,) and many eminent agriculturists from Norfolk, Suffolk, and various parts of the kingdom. This festival, instituted for the improvement of agriculture, assumes, at every anniversary, a greater degree of interest and importance.
Among the sheep exhibited there was an Arabian, and one from New Zealand; likewise a half-bred Zealand lamb, from a Southdown ewe. The Arabian sheep is a large animal, covered with a close coat of hair, like our pointer dogs. The colour of the one exhibited was white, with a black head and neck. The tail is very singularly formed—a large piece of loose flesh projects from the rump, above which grows a tail, about four inches in length, exactly resembling that of a young pig; the sheep has also a large pouch under the jaw.
A simple but most effectual method of preventing rats and mice from injuring corn stalks, was recommended by Mr. Gibbs. of Quarles, a tenant to Mr. Coke. The cost is not more than 6s. or 7s. per stack; and it has been found by several gentlemen who have made the trial, to be a complete bar to the depredations of those destructive vermin. The stack is cut round, and merely plastered with common lime and hair, about three feet high; and when properly done, it will be found that no vermin can possibly make their way into the stacks.
Mr. Coke pronounced the grubber to be one of the most useful implements upon his farm, and pointed out its superiority over the scarifier, which cuts the roots of the weeds in pieces, and thereby multiplies them; instead of which the grubber forces them up in an entire state, and even their finest fibres are destroyed. Alluding to his own farms as a proof of what a better mode of husbandry would effect, Mr. Coke observed, with respect to what was frequently said of the injury accruing from the introduction of machinery, that he employed more hands with the machinery than he could any other way. Of the mode of driling, he said, it should be from north to south, instead of from east to west. This might appear of trivial moment, but he could assert that it was worthy of attention.
About 500 persons each day sat down to dinner in the noble mansion; when a scene of hilarity and cheerfulness, intermixed with valuable information from the gentlemen whose healths were drank, was exhibited. Mr. Coke, at the close of the meeting on Wednesday evening, delivered the prizes to the successful candidates in the various classes.