SECRETARY'S REPORT. 61 



the best kept and the worst sold, grow into as many dollars and 

 more ? How many there are who esteem size to be of more conse- 

 quence than symmetry, or adaptation to the use for which they are 

 kept ? How many ever sit down to calculate the difference in 

 money value between an animal which barely pays for keeping, or 

 perhaps not that, and one which pays a profit ? 



Let us reckon a little. Suppose a man wishes to buy a cow. Two 

 are offered him, both four years old, and which might probably be 

 serviceable for ten years to come. With the same food and attend- 

 ance the first will yield for ten months in the year, an average of 

 five quarts per day, that being not far from the yield of a majority 

 of the cows in the State, — and the other for the same term will 

 yield seven quarts and of equal quality. What is the comparative 

 value of each ? The difference in yield is six hundred quarts. For 

 the purpose of this calculation we will suppose it worth three cents 

 per quart — amounting to eighteen dollars. Is not the second cow, 

 while she holds out to give it, as good as the first, and three hun- 

 dred dollars at interest besides ? If the first just pays for her food 

 and attendance, the second, yielding two-fifths more, pays forty 

 2)er cent, profit annually ; and' yet how many farmers having two 

 such cows* for sale would make more than ten or twenty or at 

 most, thirty dollars difference in the price ? The profit from one 

 is eighteen dollars a year — in ten years one hundred and eighty 

 dollars, besides the annual accumulations of interest — the profit of 

 the other is — nothing. If the seller has need to keep one, would he 

 not be wiser to give away the first, than to part with the second 

 for a hundred dollars ? 



Suppose, again, that an acre of grass or a ton of hay costs five 

 dollars, and that for its consumption by a given set of animals, the 

 farmer gets a return of five dollars worth of labor, or meat, or wool, 

 or milk. He is selling his crop at cost, and makes no profit. Sup- 

 pose by employing other animals, better horses, better cows, oxen 

 and sheep, he can get ten dollars per ton in returns. How much 

 are the latter worth more than the former ? Have they not doubled 

 the value of the crops, and increased the profit of farming from 

 nothing to a hundred per cent ? Except that the manure is not 

 doubled and the animals might not live always, could he not as 

 well afford to give the price of his farm for one set as to accept the 

 other as a gift ? 



Among many, who are in fact ignorant of what goes to consti- 

 tute merit in a breeding animal, there is an inclination to treat as 



