PARTISAN REVIEW
bellwether: "Mine's always been a pain in the neck. His behind
built three miles in the air. Got to have money for proper seed.
Got to be rich for good farming."
An old hand prepared the drench.
It
was a mixture of
Black Leaf Forty and blue vitriol. Different doses were shoved
down the lambs, ewes, and rams. We yelled the dose we want–
ed, spotted our sheep. vVe saddled ourselves on them, yanked
open the tight little mouths, and forced in the baby syringe or
the bottle. It was a tough tussle. The lambs slipped between
our legs. The ewes bucked and mounted each other.
It
took
two men to handle many of them. Our old neighbor got crack–
ed in the head by a plunging ram. He staggered into the yard
and fell into the grass. Some of the ewes passed out. "Give
them a little cold water," bawled the county agent. "Don't
hold the head up so high. The stuit'll get down their lungs.
It's the stomach we're shooting for. You Jacks and hoppers
should read the 'Shepherd Boy'."
The shed was hot. The boss worked with his shirt off. He
handled the biggest ewes and rams. None got away from him.
No drench remained in his bottles or spilled. He drenched
faster than anybody else. The sweat poured over his wry face.
As a young man he had done lots of butchering for the village.
Once a dying steer had split his face open with a kick.
After drenching the first flock, we drove the sheep into
the yard. The agent stirred the dip. This would last two
years. The creosote had never killed the nits. The arsenate
of lead in the new Cooper's Dip would do a thorough job.
The sheep were chased down the chute. They balked at
the edge of the tank. We grabbed them by their hind legs.
They fell head first. Four farmers stood in the pits alongside
the tank. They got the sheep, one hand on head and one on
back. They shoved them down. The scared things scrambled
up a cleated plank onto the drying platform. The ewes were
kept from the lambs to prevent sucking until the poison · had
dried off.
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