MOUNTAIN BORN, the story of the boy Peter and his little black cosset who grew to be the leader of a flock of sheep, is a true pastoral, moving with the seasons and the lives of the creatures on a mountain farm. Elizabeth Yates says that it began for her many years ago.

"In fact," she writes, "I was not long out of school when I knew that one of the major desires of my life was to have a sheep farm. The desire had to wait during the years that business kept my husband in England, but always the substance behind the years of travelling was the dream of a farm. We have the farm now—a few rolling acres of good New Hampshire land, watered by a mountain brook and shadowed by pine trees. Soon the sheep will be grazing in pastures. Last year, a friend made for me a sweater from wool spun as it was absorbed. The feel of it was rough and sturdy; the smell of it was strong and oily. I liked to bury my nose deep in it—and somehow, much of the story came from these moments.

"I spent hours with a New Hampshire shepherd, before writing the book. Every one of the more than 500 sheep was known and individual to him. Each had character and qualities of its own, and as he told me of them he kept saying over and over again, 'Sheep are very intelligent creatures.' Then he would tell me wonderful things to illustrate their intelligence."

Sheep, shepherds, and their ways have changed little since David herded on Judean hills, and they are as little different all over the world. There is a constancy to them that makes them something of a common denominator to civilization. So the story is set in no particular place, for its mountains and meadows, villages and people might be anywhere. The little boy in New England or England, Iceland or Brazil, who leads his father's sheep up to a mountain pasture and thinks long thoughts as he gazes across their fleecy backs into space, might be the Peter of MOUNTAIN BORN.

From the dust jacket