Sheep in the mist...
A photograph of a sheep on a misty day, Torrs, Ilfracombe.
Some very interesting things about sheep.
My surname "Sherman" means person who shears sheep.
I am captain of the Slaughtered Lamb skittles team.
It appears that we can import sheep from New Zealand but we
can't sell the sheep we raise in British fields. (What a waste of
petrol).
The Lord Chancellor of the United Kingdom sits on the Woolsack
in the House of Lords. This is meant to symbolise that the wealth
of Britain came from wool.
Selling wool through Holland and Flanders paid for the building
of a lot of British cathedrals.
I think some of the wool merchants also smuggled illegal books
like English translations of the bible as well as Lollard, Hussite
and Protestant tracts between Britain and the continent. (I can't
remember where I read this).
Some farmers near Exmoor talk of wild sheep in the hills that do
not heed the laws of man. Apparently, the ewes come down to the
farms in the winter to get serviced by the rams, eat the food put
out for domestic sheep, and raise their lambs. In the spring they
escape (with their lambs) back to the hills, following ancient sheep
trackways.
(Of course, one should never believe an Exmoor farmer).
Sheep living near the cliffs tell each other stories of Jonathan
Livingstone Sheep, the first sheep that learnt how to fly. Every
year some sheep follow his example and launch themselves into the
sky. They must have learnt to fly because none of them has ever
come back...
