FARMEES' INSTITUTES. 65 



fled to a warmer clime, the smile of the moon in its glory, and the twinkling 

 of the stars seem to be satires on warmth and comfort; even the winds are 

 too cold to blow. How fare the houseless flocks and herds this night? The 

 farmer may have fed them well and given them plenty of straw for bedding, 

 yet they are cold and wasting the food he has given them. One of the char- 

 acters of heat is its property of being radiated ; thus if we hold a heated body 

 near our face we feel its heat, which is called radiant heat. In nature radia- 

 tion is going on between all heated bodies. The dew of summer and the hoar 

 frost of autumn are effects of tlie heat of the earth being radiated. We have 

 all noticed, I dare say, that dew is not formed during cloudy nights, nor 

 beneath the overhanging branches of trees. In these cases the clouds and 

 leaves intercept the rays of heat and return them to the earth, which does not 

 become cold enough to precipitate the moisture of the air. The heat of ani- 

 mals is as readily radiated as that of inanimate bodies. "The lemming, a 

 small animal of the rat tribe, has been known to perish from this cause when 

 the temperature of the air was at the freezing point of water, or even above it." 

 "In tlie polar regions the dogs employed in drawing sledges are unable to 

 resist the cold when at rest unless confined in snow huts, where radiation is 

 prevented, though the temperature of the air in these huts is from zero to 

 three and four degrees below."* If the radiation of heat from the body of 

 the lemming destroys its life with the thermometer marking +32° or a little 

 higher, what must be the tax upon the systems of some of our cattle and horses 

 placed in the same positions and the thermometer marking from 0° F. to 10° 

 F. below? I am sure we have no reason to wonder that we see so many ani- 

 mated skeletons in barn yards every spring, and after having seen the same 

 frames well covered with fat the preceding autumn. 



After reviewing the different external conditions that affect the farmer's ani- 

 mals when not properly sheltered during the winter, we may find it interesting 

 to study the internal processes of waste of the animals under the above de- 

 scribed conditions. In all plants used for food for animals, we find a number 

 of substances of simple composition which if burned are resolved into carbonic 

 acid and water; starch, sugar and gum are of this class, and are commonly 

 called the amyloids; but, for our purpose, they may be called the combusti- 

 bles, as they are consumed in the animal's system in producing heat in ordi- 

 nary circumstances; aside from these substances we find in grains, and in 

 different parts of the plant one of more complex composition, viz. : oil. Veg- 

 etable oil closely resembles animal oil, and is readily converted into fat, which 

 is stored up in the body, when the animal is properly fed; one of the func- 

 tions of fat, when stored up in this Avay, is to protect the animal from cold ; 

 it being a poor conductor of heat; but in case of need it is consumed in pro- 

 ducing heat. Besides the fats and amyloids we find a number of substances 

 of a most complex composition. These substances combine with the elements 

 of the amyloids or fats, a quantity of nitrogen, phosphorus and sulphur; 

 and are called the albuminoids ; they supply the muscular and nervous sys- 

 tems with nourishment. A just combination of these three classes of matters 

 in the food for animals, would be the most perfect economy we could ask in 

 agriculture, were it not that the just combination would, in practice, require 

 too great an expenditure of time, money and Ip.bor on the part of tlie farmer. 

 If the substances of each of these clasccs are present in the food in the re- 

 quired abundance, the aniinal thrives, at least does not lose; but if we sup- 



*CoUne Traite de Physiologie coaiparec des aiiiniaux. 



