Judging Cattle in the Show-Eing. 13 



of purpose. When in our examination we take up the evidences 

 of temperament, there is opportunity for close observation in 

 determining fitness for any special service. Between the nervous- 

 and phlegmatic there are many shades, and to classify so that 

 each shall have credit calls for skill, the result of practice. Yet 

 it is just this skill which the milk producer or dairyman must 

 have if the weeding process so necessary is to be intelligently 

 applied. 



The pathway of human experience is strewn with wrecks where 

 the cold phlegmatic man has attempted to fill the sphere set apart 

 for his nervous neighbor. Large production in our dairy cows is 

 found only in the more highly nervous organisms. If this be 

 balanced by intelligence, then we have the profitable producer. 

 So is it with the driving horse, the egg-producing hen, and there 

 must be some method by which, in our annual fairs, these ele- 

 ments of success may be made clear to the man who has not yet 

 entered into an appreciation of the importance of these relations. 

 The worth of the individual will always settle the question of the 

 worth of the herd, and to bring out the individual characteristics 

 of each one is legitimately within the scope of the score card. 



We need to fix permanently in mind the fact that form governs 

 purpose and that there is no place in the economy of the closing 

 days of this nineteenth century for a man or an animal which is 

 not built for something specific. So important is it that we must 

 graft this thought into the warp and woof of our being, if we are 

 to stand successfully in the competition of the next twenty-five 

 years. No one opportunity offers such advantages for getting 

 clear and unmistakable evidence of what is demanded to-day as 

 the annual exhibition ; but to realize the most, a man must be a 

 competitor and not an indifferent visitor, and the system of 

 awarding premiums one which will furnish the greatest possible 

 amount of information, not only of the strong, but especially the 

 weak points in his animal or product. It is this and this alone 

 which will educate, which will improve and advance. There are 

 valuable animals in every herd. Are they the result of well- 

 directed efforts or are they accidental products? If the latter, 



