282 [Senate 



one for hay, sheaves, &c.j and a close one for fruit and vegetables. 

 The naked' v^heels are handy to haul spars, poles, and all kinds of 

 long timber on. In hitching a cart to the oxen, the tongue or spire 

 thereof passes into the ring of the ox-yoke, as far as the shoulder in 

 the tongue will permit ; an iron instrument called a copes pin, resem- 

 bling the capital letter U, is put on the end of the tongue, embracing 

 it above and below, and the copes pin is inserted through the end of 

 the tongue and through the copes. This copes is for the purpose of 

 hitching the second yoke of oxen to, when necessary. 



Wherever oxen and yokes are used, chains become indispensable ; 

 four of these, each ten feet long, with a hook in each end, or part of 

 them with a ring in one end and a hook at the other, are enough for 

 two or three yokes of oxen. 



There is no good reason why the ox should not be worked singly ; 

 so might cows, when not at the pail, very well do the single plowing, 

 and haul light loads in carts ; and it would be yet more economical 

 and expedient to spay and work heifers under certain circumstances. 

 In Spain and France it is a common practice. Every judicious farmer 

 will endeavor to get all possible remuneration for the certain expense 

 attendant upon the keeping of every thing that consumes the produce 

 of his land. Even the dog that eats what would keep a pig, besides 

 guarding his house, protecting his fields, and finding his game, is made 

 by the calculating New-England man to churn his butter. 



It is observed that less food is necessary for spayed heifers to keep 

 jind fatten them than is required for the ox ; and Mr. Marshall, in his 

 Rural Economy of Yorkshire, remarks, that it is a fact well establish- 

 ed in the practice of that district, that they work better, and have 

 better wind than oxen. 



It is a common thing to see a single ox in a cart, at Norfolk in 

 Virginia, among a people as little as any other observant of improve- 

 ments going on in the agricultural machinery. That whole states, 

 even where oxen are used, should forego the use of single oxen, serves 

 to show how proverbially slow is the change of habits among agri- 

 culturists. Large bulls of immense strength dre often kept and fed 

 through the entire year, for the sole purpose of their services for 

 eight or ten cows, when they might haul immense quantities of wood 

 and manure in vehicles adapted to the purpose. 



For an ox working singly, some recommend a single harness with 

 the collar reversed ; but for the reasons he gives, and which are ob- 

 vious, the single yoke recommended by Mr. Stabler, and here exhi- 

 bited, is greatly to be preferred. When the collar is used, and the 

 draught heavy, the pressure of the traces on the sides is obviated by 

 the yoke. The length for a single yoke must be proportioned to the 

 thickness of the animal, so that the traces will be as far apart when 

 fastened to a small hook on the under side of each end as is required 

 to prevent his sides from being chafed. The following will show the 

 proper shape of the single yoke : 



