102 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



acts of generation belongs to the strongest males to the exclusion 

 of the weak, and as such a predominance is favorable to the pro- 

 creation of the male sex, it would follow that the number of males 

 would tend to suppass incessantly that of the females, amongst 

 whom no want of energy or power would turn aside from genera- 

 tion, and the species would find in it a fatal obstacle to its repro- 

 duction. But, on the other hand, if it was true that the strongest 

 females and the best nurses amongst them produce females rather 

 than males, nature would thus oppose a contrary law, which would 

 establish the equilibrium, and by an admirable harmony would 

 secure the perfection and preservation of the species, by confiding 

 the reproduction of either sex to the most perfect type of each 

 respectively." 



In-and-in Breeding. — It has long been a disputed point whether 

 the system of breeding in-and-in or the opposite one of frequent 

 crossing has the greater tendency to maintain or improve the char- 

 acter of stock. The advocates of both systems are earnest and 

 confident of being in the right. The truth probably is, as in some 

 other similar disputes, that both are right and both wrong — to a 

 certain extent, or within certain limits. 



The term in-and-in is often very loosely used and is variously 

 understood ; some, and among these several of the best writers, 

 confine the phrase to the coupling of those of exactly the same 

 blood, i. e. brothers and sisters ; while others include in it breeding 

 from parents and offspring, and others still employ the term to 

 embrace those of more distant relationship. For the latter, the 

 term breeding in, or close breeding, is deemed more fitting. 



The prevalent opinion is decidedly against the practice of breed- 

 ing from any near relationships ; it being usually found that 

 degeneracy follows, and often to a serious degree ; but it is not 

 proved tliat tliis degeneracy, although very common and even 

 usual, is yet a necessary consequence. That ill effects follow in a 

 majority of cases is not to be doubted, but this is easily and sufS- 

 ciently accounted for upon other grounds. In a state of nature 

 animals of near aflRnities interbreed without injurious results, and 

 it is found by experience that where domesticated animals are of a 

 pure race, or of a distinct, well defined and pure breed, the coup- 

 ling of those of near affinities is not so often followed by injurious 

 effects as when they are crosses, or of mixed or mongrel origin, 

 like the great majority of the cattle in the country at large. In 



