WEST OXFORD SOCIETY. 77 



be modified by stating the purpose for which a herd is to be kept, — 

 whether for the shambles, for work, or for milk. The inquiry is 

 not answered by taking ten tons of Short horns and ten tons of 

 Devons and feeding fifty tons of food to each lot, and then selling 

 the beef which may be as 21 to 19. The entire history of each lot 

 must be known. The one may have credit for milk, the other for 

 work. The cost of each, with the debits and credits, should be 

 kept down to the day they leave the feeder for the butcher. It 

 must be known which beef fetched the more money, that repre- 

 sented by 21 or by 19. 



The fact of having bred animals of rare symmetry, great size, 

 early maturity, of first rate quality, &c., is not enough to settle the 

 point. Inquiries like these suggest themselves: "After how many 

 failures was this done ? "At what cost?" " How stands the bal- 

 ance ?" Upon the true answers to interrogations like these every 

 thing touching this subject depends. 



The first object with a breeder should be, to furnish his country- 

 men with milk, butter, cheese, cream, &c. The next is to furnish 

 beef; milk and beef in case of cattle, and wool and mutton, in case 

 of sheep. The breeder must cater to appetites which, luckily, exer- 

 tions have made keen rather than critical, as well as for those 

 blunted by sedentary and intellectual pursuits, and thereby stimu- 

 lated to the appreciation of quality, both of beef and mutton. 



New breeds claim the first notice, because created by man, or 

 more accurately, made by crossing of races. The first in this rank 

 is the improved breed of Short horns, uniting in a most remarkable 

 degree milking qualities with a tendency to fatten. In the market 

 at Birmingham, where the beef of cows from dairy districts is seen, 

 the blue loin is also noticeable. It is claimed for the improved 

 breeds of both cattle and sheep, that from the same amount of feed 

 in a given time, they will jaeld a larger weight of beef and mutton 

 than animals of the races. This is undoubtedly true of given cases ; 

 but to give it a fair test, select 1,000 Devons or Hei-efords, females, 

 and 1,000 Short horns, and with the latter, there will be fewer ani- 

 mals produced, and more of a low, coarse and exceptionable quality, 

 than by either of the old races. The same would be true of the 

 Leicester ewes. This is because art is less certain than nature, 

 whose operations are unvarying, or nearly so, where man has not 

 interfered. With regard to breeds, specimens of races and varie- 

 ties, the combined will crop out, every now and then, to disappoint 

 the expectations of the breeder. The nondescript, introduced into 



