64 AGRICULTURAL REPORT.

seventy-five three-quarter plood females, and six seven-eighths blood females. He has also four females three-quarters Asiatic and one-

quarter Thibet shawl. There appears to be no improvement in this mixture with the Shawl goat, over that produced by a union with the common goat; indeed, the product which we saw in Charleston, from what was cal

led the Cashmere and the Asiatic goat, was decidedly inferior.

The half-bloods, as we have stated, have an under-coat of fine, downy wool, closely resembling and equal in quality and quantity to the fleece of the Thibet Shawl goats imported into this country. The three-quarter breeds in mid-winter show an under-coat of greater quantity and length. In both grades, this under-fur drops out in summer. The fffteen-sixteenths or one-sixteenth common goat resem. bles the Asiatic goat in quantity and quality of fleece and size of carcass, so closely that We found it impossible to distinguish them from the full-bloods. Another advantage is likely to result from this admixture with the common goat: the half-blood females produce two kids at a birth, and the three-quarter blood females generally, although not always, two. Thus the breed may be rendered more prolific. We here perceive in how short a period ofe time our whole race of now almost worthless goats may be converted into a breed

valuable both for its flesh and wool.

REGIONS OF COUNTRY TOo WHIOCH THEY ARE BEST ADAPTED

There does not appear to be any part of the United States to which the constitution of this goat is not adapted. Damp climates, like England, where there are almost daily drizzling rains, are inju⸗- rious. This animal scarcely needs water. We were informed by Mr. Peters that three of them remained in a lot, feeding on weeds and grass, without any water, during three months, and keeping in fine order. Our whole country is warm in summer, and portions of it very cold in winter. If this goat is constitutionally adapted to brave the cold of the Steppes of the Eastern Caucassian, Himalaya, and Altaian Mountains, it would not suffer, if fed in winter, in our ld thrive along all the sides of the Alleghany

coldest regions, and wou and Rocky mountains. It has improved in the comparatively warm

climate of Carolina. It would do well in the hilly country of the GCarolinas and Georgia, many portions of which are now scarcely cultivated. The whole western country, from Nebraska down to Western Texas and New Mexico, may be rendered a feeding-ground for this wool-bearing goat. The mountain regions of Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Tennessee will be found admirably adapted to the raising of large flocks of these goats and their crosses. The wild growth of the mountain-sides, with the native grasses of the rich valleys will afford pasturage summer and winter at a trifling cost. Thée worn-out plantations and poor pine lands of the Carolinas and Georgia might be brought into requisition to supply meat for our markets, which, by many Persons, would be preferred to venison. A

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