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groped forward a tiny lamb dodged under my arm and began to suck at my patient’s udder. He was clearly enjoying it, too, if the little tail, twirling inches from my face, meant anything.
    “Where did this bloke come from?” I asked, still feeling round.
    The farmer smiled. “Oh that’s Herbert. Poor little youth’s mother won’t have ‘im at any price. Took a spite at him at birth though she thinks world of her other lamb.”
    “Do you feed him, then?”
    “Nay, I was going to put him with the pet lambs but I saw he was fendin’ for himself. He pops from one ewe to t’other and gets a quick drink whenever he gets chance. I’ve never seen owt like it.”
    “Only a week old and an independent spirit, eh?”
    “That’s about the size of it, Jim. I notice ‘is belly’s full every mornin’ so I reckon his ma must let him have a do during the night. She can’t see him in the dark; it must be the look of him she can’t stand.”
    I watched the little creature for a moment. To me he seemed as full of knock-kneed charm as any of the others. Sheep were funny things.
    I soon had the other leg out and once that obstruction was removed the lamb followed easily. He was a grotesque sight lying on the strawed grass, his enormous head dwarfing his body, but his ribs were heaving reassuringly and I knew the head would shrink back to normal as quickly as it had expanded. I had another search round inside the ewe but the uterus was empty.
    “There’s no more, Rob,” I said.
    The farmer grunted. “Aye, I thowt so, just a big single ‘un. They’re the ones that cause the trouble.”
    Drying my arms, I watched Herbert. He had left my patient when she moved round to lick her lamb and he was moving speculatively among the other ewes. Some of them warned him off with a shake of the head but eventually he managed to sneak up on a big, wide-bodied sheep and pushed his head underneath her. Immediately she swung round andwitha fierce upward butt of her hard skull she sent the little animal flying high in the air in a whirl of flailing legs. He landed with a thud on his back and as I hurried toward him he leaped to his feet and trotted away.
    “Awd bitch!” shouted the farmer and as I turned to him in some concern he shrugged. “I know, poor little beggar, it’s rough, but I’ve got a feelin’ he wants it this way rather than being in the pen with the pet lambs. Look at ‘im now.”
    Herbert, quite unabashed, was approaching another ewe and as she bent over her feeding trough he nipped underneath her and his tail went into action again. There was no doubt about it—that lamb had guts.
    “Rob,” I said as he caught my second patient, “why do you call him Herbert?”
    “Well that’s my youngest lad’s name and that lamb’s just like ‘im the way he puts his head down and gets stuck in, fearless like.”
    I put my hand into the second ewe. Here was a glorious mix-up of three lambs; little heads, legs, a tail, all fighting their way toward the outside world and effectively stopping each other from moving an inch.
    “She’s been hanging about all morning and pa*’,” Rob said. “I knew summat was wrong.”
    Moving a hand carefully around inside I began the fascinating business of sorting out the tangle which is just about my favorite job in practice. I had to bring a head and two legs up together in order to deliver a lamb, but they had to belong to the same lamb or I was in trouble. It was a matter of tracing each leg back to see if it was hind or fore, to find if it joined the shoulder or disappeared into the depths.
    After a few minutes I had a lamb assembled inside with his proper appendages but as I drew the legs into view the neck telescoped and the head slipped back; there was barely room for it to come through the pelvic bones along with the shoulders and I had to coax it through with a finger in the eye socket. This was groaningly painful as the bones squeezed my hand but only for a few seconds because