(98.) _Lambing time._ When the ewes begin to drop their lambs, a time which ordinarily happens in the first or second week of April, but which, in other modes of management, must be dated twenty-two weeks after the tupping season, the shepherd has many calls upon his skill and watchfulness. In bad seasons, sheep are apt to prove unkind to their offspring, and none more so than the Cheviots. In this event, the best pastures should be selected for them, or turnips may be carted to them; but as gimmer hogs are often quite incapable of furnishing the necessary quantity of milk, the shepherd ought always to be provided with a bottle of milk, which he should drop from his own mouth into that of any lambs which may require it. Such mothers as appear to suffer in bringing forth, should be relieved with the utmost gentleness; and when a miscarriage occurs, if the weather be at the same time unfavourable, the dam ought to receive the shelter of a roof. When the ewe is lost in yeaning, her lamb, if it survive her, must be reared by another dam. Some little artifice is always necessary to induce a ewe to adopt the offspring of another. Covering the lamb with the skin of her own dead one, is sometimes resorted to, but this is hardly required, as any dam will take to another's offspring if the parties be shut up for some time together. Ewes that are late in lambing should be collected together, so as to be more under the care of the shepherd, and ought to be well fed, for the sake of bringing forward their lambs. Those lambs which are very far behind the rest must be prepared for the butcher, as they would make but a poor figure at the Lammas sales.